
Class ~&)(nlZ1 

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MEffiiGHT DEPosro 



The New 

LIVING PULPIT 



OF THE 



CHRISTIAN CHURCH 



A Series of Discourses, Doctrinal and 
Practical, By Representative Men Among 

THE DISCIPLES OF CHRIST 



With Introduction on the History of Preaching and Brief 

Biographical Sketch and Halftone Portrait 

of Each Contributor 



Arranged and Edited by 

W. T. MOORE 



JUBILEE EDITION 



ST. LOUIS 

Christian Board of Publication 

1918 



^} 



^i 



Copyright, 1918 

Christian Board of Publication 

St. Louis 



JAN -2 1913 

Ci.A.5 11194 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

Publishers ' Preface 5 

Introduction Editor £ 

First Principles Z. T. Sweeney 49 

What Does God Do? H. L. Willett 65 

The Light op Life; or, God's Method op 

Revelation J.H. Garrison 79 

The Old Gospel for the New Age E. L. Powell 91 

The Preacher and His Message William Henry Book. . 103 

Man and the Book Carey E. Morgan 115 

The Ministry op Mediation Edgar DeWitt Jones . . 129 

The Philosophy of the Conditions of Sal- 
vation Hugh McLellan 141 

The Return to Faith Geo. H. Combs 153 

The Key to Spiritual Knowledge /. J. Spencer 167 

Preaching of the Cross — The Power of 

God Chas. "Reign Scoville . . 183 

The Unchanging Gospel C. J. Tannar 195 

Established in Present Truth I. N. McCash 207 

The Appeal of the Cross Frank M. Bowling .... 219 

A Lost Art W. F. Richardson 231 

True Apostolic Succession TV. E. Crabtree 241 

Conviction Geo. A. Campbell 251 

The Compulsion of Responsibility. ". Frederick TV. Burnham. 265 

Ideals of the Lord 's Prayer J. J. Haley 283 

The Measure of Man B. H. Cross-field 299 

Violence to the Kingdom of God Burris A. Jenkins 309 

Christian Stewardship C. S. Medbury 321 

The Call of the Divine B. A. Abbott 331 

The Pain of Thinking Peter Aimslie 339 

Some of the Spiritual Values of Life Allan B. PMlputt 349 

A Sermon to the Moral Man P. H. Welshimer 363 

Rest Harry D. Smith , . 375 

The House Beautiful Allen B. Moore 389 



PUBLISHERS' PREFACE 

THE publishers have peculiar satisfaction in sending forth 
' ' The New Living Pulpit ' ' for many reasons. A new book 
of value is always an event which the thoughtful part of the 
community welcomes. In the preface of "The Living Pulpit," 
issued fifty years ago, the publishers said : * * It is, and has been, 
our intention to follow the present volume, in due course, with 
a second, and, possibly, a third, until the series shall be so com- 
plete as fairly and fully to represent the Living Pulpit of the 
Christian Church, and shall embody a mass of sermons wherein 
all the vital or important points bearing upon the faith, con- 
duct, and salvation of man will be ably and eloquently discussed. ' ' 
This is perhaps the beginning of the belated fulfillment of that 
tentative promise. Every sermon carries the atmosphere of the 
romance of rescued souls, comforted hearts, beautified lives and 
enriched civilization. 

The problems in issuing a volume of this character are numer- 
ous, but not the least one is that of elimination. The plan of the 
book was not to select the greatest preachers— no one could de- 
cide such a question, — but rather to assemble the sermons of 
well-known representative men of different types. It is certain 
that there are many other preachers amongst the Disciples of 
Christ who could present sermons equal in thought, style and 
tone to those in this volume. To them the book will be as in- 
teresting and will be as gladly received as though the fruit of 
their own labor. And such indeed it is in a very real sense, for 
every sermon is of the soul of the whole group to which its 
immediate author belongs. 

The Brotherhood will not be slow to appreciate the unique 
services of the editor of these sermons. This book of sermons 
will remain a monument to his warm interest in the progress of 

5 



6 PUBLISHERS' PREFACE 

Christian people to which he belongs, and his brethren will 
prize it because so many precious hours were drawn from his 
slender stock of time and strength in order to give it to the 
church. Dr. "William T. Moore has lived a long, useful life and 
though now far beyond man's allotted time on earth, in many 
ways his mind is as eager about the great questions of the 
church as when he first passed through the gates of youth. He 
has studied the best things and never failed to urge the for- 
ward look and the widest Christian brotherhood. His passion 
has been to serve. May we not infer from the fact of this book 
that he believes preaching to be the supreme work of the church ? 
And seeing the place Christ gave it, is it not the greatest work 
in the world f 

There are many values attached to such a volume. It affords 
opportunity to study the continuity of thought among the 
Disciples of Christ, and to note changes that may betoken either 
progress or reaction. We believe none of the latter will be dis- 
covered. The voices may be different but their message is the 
same. Different problems call for different emphasis, and from 
the inexhaustible treasures of the Holy Bible may be drawn 
doctrines, precepts, ethics, and ideals to meet the moral and 
spiritual emergencies that may arise in the course of human 
history. 

The publishers believe sermons deserve much more attention 
than is usually accorded them. Upon them the church depends 
for its spiritual life, and out of their substance the fabric of 
character is woven. 

The American people are too active to have a strong liking 
for sermons, but it is all the more necessary that they should 
turn to them in order to cultivate habits of thoughtfulness, of 
devotion and of meditation. 

These sermons will be useful for Bible Colleges and Theo- 
logical Schools as models to be studied by the young men in- 
tending to enter the ministry, and churches temporarily with- 
out pastors will find it profitable to read these discourses Sunday 
by Sunday from their pulpits. 



PUBLISHERS' PREFACE 7 

Not the least interesting part of this volume consists of the 
short, remarkable biographies of the preachers because they are 
interpretations of human personality by one who has lived long 
and observed both widely and minutely. 

Special attention is directed to the Introduction, which con- 
tains an interesting history of preaching. 

St. Louis, Mo. 
Oct. 1, 1918. 



INTRODUCTION 



DEFINITION 

PREACHING is the message of God set to the music of the 
human voice, animated by the Divine Spirit, and announced 
with the fervor of a regenerate soul, conscious of its great 
responsibility. It is not, therefore, intellectual gymnastics, 
nor is it simply methodized emotions. The intellect and heart 
are both involved, as well as the unction of the Holy Spirit. 
The message itself is a union of the Divine and the human. 
When it became evident that man could not govern himself 
and would not be governed by God, he was given a governor 
who represents in his great personality both God and man. 
Consequently, Immanuel — "God with us" — is an appropriate 
name for him who is the soul and center of the Gospel message 
which is the heavenly inspired theme for every discourse the 
preacher is commanded to deliver to a lost and ruined world. 
Hence to preach Christ in fullness is to preach the Gospel, and 
to preach the Gospel in its facts, is to preach the death of 
Christ for our sins, according to the Scriptures, his burial, and 
resurrection the third day, according to the Scriptures. This 
Gospel is sometimes called the "word of reconciliation," by 
which men are persuaded to ground their arms of rebellion and 
become obedient to the Divine Will. It is the power of God 
unto salvation to every one who believeth, to the Jew first, and 
also to the Greek. It is therefore the * ' good news ' ' of salvation 
to the lost, delivered by one who has been redeemed — the 
smile of heaven bedewed with the tears of human sympathy. 
It points out the pathway of light which leads out of the dark 
wilderness of sin, and lifts up the standard of hope again to 
those who are burdened with conscious guilt. True preaching 
being the appeal of a heart touched by the love of God to 

9 



10 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

hearts bowed down with the load of sin, the preacher deals 
with life and death, with time and eternity. 

It is safe, therefore, to affirm that the preacher's position is 
the most exalted, the most comprehensive, and the most inspir- 
ing. And if my definition be correct, then it is impossible for 
the sermon on the printed page to make the same impression as 
when it is spoken with the living voice. But it does not follow 
that the printed sermon is powerless to edify, strengthen and 
encourage those who read with the spirit and the understand- 
ing. The printed Sermon on the Mount is not equal to that 
sermon as delivered by the great preacher whose wonderful 
personality added impressiveness to every word. Nowhere is 
the charm of personality more distinctly felt than in the 
pulpit. The printed sermon, in the Book of the Acts of the 
Apostles, which Peter preached on the Day of Pentecost, in its 
effect on the reader, must be feeble indeed when compared 
with the spoken sermon on that memorable occasion. Hence 
there is a marked difference between reading a sermon and 
hearing a sermon. But the printed sermon has its place, and in 
that place it is a great power for good. 

HISTORY OF PREACHING 

We are mainly dependent on written and printed sermons for 
what we know of the pulpit during the past ages of the church. 
Preaching in some sense is recognized in the Old Testament, 
but it was not made a prominent factor in the advocacy of any 
cause until the coming of our Divine Lord. It then became 
an important means of propagating the facts and principles of 
the religion which Christ came to establish; and since the 
Day of Pentecost it has been the chief means for world-wide 
evangelization as well as for building up the saints in Faith, 
Hope and Love. 

In view of the great importance of preaching in carrying 
forward the Banner of the Cross, it is certainly remarkable 
that no comprehensive and worthy history of it has ever been 
written; for no theme, in connection with the rise, progress, 
and development of the Church, is so vital, so full of important 



INTRODUCTION 11 

and interesting facts. Not less than a score of volumes could 
be filled with the most valuable and entertaining matter, and 
then the half would not be told. 

Of course, no attempt, in what must be only a brief sketch, 
will be made to supply this need; but it seems to be highly 
appropriate that such sermons as are to follow in this volume, 
should be introduced with some account of the pulpit, both 
past and present, that the reader may have some idea of the 
rich field of sacred literature which has so long remained 
uncultivated. 

FIEST PERIOD 

During the early days of Christianity preaching was a very 
simple matter. The church also was very simple in all its 
appointments, while the Gospel itself was a plain, matter-of- 
fact story of Jesus and his love. There were no church build- 
ings, such as were used at a later period, and the whole service 
was quite unpretentious in all its parts. The law that governed 
was: "Everything should be done to edification," while the 
mutual participation of the brethren generally in the service 
forbade the preaching of a sermon by one man, as at the 
present time. The fourteenth chapter of First Corinthians 
gives us an outline sketch of what took place in apostolic 
times when the whole church at a place came together. For 
the most part the Assembly met in private houses or in syna- 
gogues, and the service was somewhat like our modern prayer 
meeting, but doubtless very much more edifying. Short homi- 
lies, by one or more brethren, took the place of the modern 
sermon, while singing, prayers, reading the Scriptures, and the 
breaking of bread, occupied the rest of the time. There was no 
attempt at preaching in the modern manner. All the members 
were children of God, and as such were brethren, and this 
family idea prevailed in all the services of the Assembly. 

During the early days of the Campbellian Reformation the 
Lord's Supper, observed every first day of the week, was a 
prominent feature of the Lord's Day worship and was the 
chief attraction in bringing the Disciples together each Lord's 
Day. It was this observance more than anything else that held 



12 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

the Disciples in union during the formative period of their 
great movement. Nor has it lost its power to unify at the 
present time, when properly administered. When occupying 
its primitive place in the Lord's Day worship, nothing will do 
so much to illustrate the truth of the Master's statement when 
he said: "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men 
unto me." In the lifting up of Christ, on each Lord's Day, in 
this memorial service, the Disciples are certainly following the 
example of the apostolic churches. 

The preaching of the early church was of two kinds, or rather 
there was teaching as well as preaching. Following the great 
Commission which Christ gave to his apostles, the early Chris- 
tians went everywhere preaching the word, by which they 
made converts, and then these converts were taught the "all 
things" which Christ had commanded. Consequently the 
simple gospel was preached to the aliens and when these aliens 
were brought into the kingdom, they were instructed in what- 
ever was necessary to build them up in their most holy faith. 

We have scanty testimony with respect to the early post- 
apostolic church, since most of the Christian writings were de- 
stroyed during the reign of Diocletian (303 A.D.). But the 
following quotation from Justin Martyr gives a trustworthy 
statement of what took place at the meetings of the Assembly: 

1 1 On the day which is called Sunday all the churches inhabit- 
ing the towns or country assemble in the same place. The 
memorials of the Apostles and the writings of the prophets are 
read as time permits. When the reader has finished the presi- 
dent of the assembly delivers an exhortation and charges his 
hearers to imitate those holy examples. Then we all rise to- 
gether and offer up prayers. After the prayers, bread is 
brought forward, and wine and water; the president then in 
his turn presents prayers and praises to God, according to his 
ability, and the people express their assent by saying 'Amen.' 
The Eucharist is distributed, and every one partakes of it, 
while the deacons carry a share to those who are absent. 
Those who possess worldly goods bring a freewill offering in 
proportion to their means. The offerings are collected and 
placed in the hands of the president, who, by this means, 



INTRODUCTION 13 

supplies the needs of the orphans and widows, of those who are 
in want through sickness or other causes, of those in prison, 
and of sojourners who are strangers. In a word he is the helper 
of the needy." (Justin Apol. 187-8). 

Justin was put to death at Rome, A.D. 165, so it will be seen 
that during the first hundred years of the church's history, 
preaching did not occupy in the Lord's Day service the im- 
portant place it does at the present time. Nevertheless, the 
evangelistic part of preaching was still the chief means of 
spreading the gospel. 

SECOND PERIOD 

In the next period, extending from the first of the third 
century to the close of the fifth, preaching was confined more 
definitely to a distinct class of men. In the Apostolic Age and 
for some time afterwards, there was no official distinction 
between preachers and people. All were "Kings and priests 
to God." But during this second period, preaching, as well 
as much else, was radically changed. (1) Changes in the con- 
stitution of the church now began to dawn. (2) The distinction 
of the clergy from the laity, or the formation of a sacerdotal 
caste, as opposed to the evangelical idea of the priesthood 
became a fixed and prominent feature in the historic develop- 
ment of the church. (3) The multiplication of church offices. 

The character of the church membership was very different 
from what it was in the first period. There was room now for 
pulpit eloquence and also opportunity for educated men to 
enter the ministry. Two schools held the most prominent and 
influential positions — Alexandria in Egypt, and Antioch in 
Syria. At the head of the first was Origen, the most scholarly 
and eminent preacher of his age. Later John Chrysostom was 
the great preacher at Antioch. His preaching, though faulty 
in some respects, in real eloquence, boldness and masterly ap- 
peal, has seldom been equaled and perhaps never surpassed in 
all the history of the church. 

But there was now opportunity for this kind of preaching. 
The union of Church and State under Constantine had changed 



14 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

nearly all the early forms and habits of the church, as well as 
some of the vital fundamental principles. 

The separation of the Eastern and Western Churches belongs 
to the period now under consideration. Though Greece was 
conquered, it still had great influence. Through its language, 
literature and philosophy it exerted great power over its con- 
querors. Especially was the Eastern Church modified by 
Grecian philosophy. Dogmatic theology found willing help 
in the subtle forms of the Greek language. 

The West was more practical, and gave much attention to 
organization and government. Consequently the removal of 
the seat of government from Some to Constantinople, by Con- 
stantine, did much to widen the breach between the East and 
West, until it became permanent, and the separation has con- 
tinued to the present time. 

All these changes helped to alter the character of the preach- 
ing, especially the preaching of the Eastern Church. The 
large increase in church membership and the character of this 
membership gave favorable opportunity for extending the 
sphere of preaching in both the East and the West. 

The preaching was also affected by the new races that became 
hearers. Indeed, most of the hearers were not satisfied with 
preaching that was not eloquent. They demanded sermons 
that made the nerves tingle, and that they could taste on the 
tongue. It must have something in it akin to what was heard 
in the theaters, forums, and the market places. Even the 
educated and wealthy people demanded spectacular services, 
instead of the simple homilies and the religious oration be- 
came a sort of idol of those who had "itching ears" and whose 
spiritual food had to be seasoned with the spell of oratory in 
order to hold their attention. The result was, large basilicas 
were built for the pulpit orators, such as those at Milan, Con- 
stantinople, and other important centers. Thousands were 
drawn to these basilicas to hear such preachers as Origen, 
Basil and Chrysostom of the Eastern Church and Jerome, 
Ambrose, and Augustine of the Western Church. 

In view of the weakness of human nature, it is not remarkable 
that the clergy fell victims to these influences, for it has ever 



INTRODUCTION 15 

been true, as the Scriptures affirm that "like people, like 
priests" (Hosea 4:9). Still, it is quite true that all the clergy 
did not yield to the general demoralization. Some remained 
faithful to the early standards, and these shining examples 
were all the brighter because of the prevailing spiritual dark- 
ness. But it cannot be doubted that at this time, most of the 
clergy were simply tools of the state, and gave little or no 
help in making the pulpit a forceful factor in keeping the 
church faithful to the Apostolic ideals. The result was that 
perhaps no period in the history of Christianity was so proline 
in departures from New Testament teaching as that of the 
fourth and fifth centuries. 

These centuries have profound and suggestive lessons for 
the pulpit of the twentieth century. Upon this signboard of 
the pulpit of these early days is written this warning, "Be- 
ware, lest being carried away of the wicked, ye fall from your 
own steadfastness." (2 Peter 3:17). 

Leo, the Great, was the first Pope who left any sermonic 
remains, and he left 96 homilies. These are generally short, 
and aim at a sort of smartness of style which has in it little to 
recommend. Indeed these homilies show many of the signs of 
degeneracy of the pulpit as compared with the preaching of 
Origen, Chrysostom, and Athanasius. 

Gregory, the Great, is a better representative of preaching. 
He was better educated and attached greater importance to 
the pulpit. He wrote a treatise on preaching which was trans- 
lated into several languages, and had considerable circulation, 
but did little, if anything, to improve the preaching of the 
period. 

THIRD PERIOD 

We are now compelled to pass over much ground, all of 
which tends to show a steady decline in the character of 
preaching. This period includes the reign of Charlemagne and 
the establishment of the Holy Roman Empire, and extends to 
the Lutheran Reformation. As this period is fairly familiar to 
most students of history, little more than a few facts need be 
given. 



16 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Charlemagne, next to Constantine, was perhaps the most 
unalterable friend of the union of Church and State of any of 
the emperors; and his extreme Eastianism led him to use the 
clergy in questionable ways to help in extending his empire. 
He well knew how to secure their influence, and to make it 
answer his purposes. The two schools which dominated the 
pulpit at this time were the Scholastic and the Mystic. One 
appealed to the head and the other to the heart. It has been 
truly said of the Scholastics that they were "light without 
heat, while the Mystics were heat without light. ' ' In any case, 
this separation of head and heart made it impossible for 
preaching to perform its legitimate function, and the result 
was that preaching went to the lowest possible point to be called 
preaching at all, and for about 400 years the pulpit "had a 
name to live by and was practically dead," and then a brighter 
day began to dawn. About the year 1200 preaching began to 
recover, and during the thirteenth century there were distinct 
signs of life again. 

It would be interesting, as well as instructive, if space per- 
mitted, to notice some of the influences which operated in 
bringing about a better state of things, but an adequate treat- 
ment would require a large volume and less than this can be 
of little value to the reader. 

FOURTH PERIOD 

The scholasticism of the school of Thomas Aquinas was 
followed by such harbingers of the Reformation as John Ger- 
son in France; John Wickliffe in England; John Huss in 
Bohemia, and Savonarola in Italy. These were the robins of 
the coming spring time, or the morning stars of the Lutheran 
Reformation. 

This reformation ushered in a new era in the history of the 
world, and preaching was as much affected as anything else. 
Luther himself was the embodiment of those qualities which 
belong to the true preacher of the gospel. Though at first he 
distrusted his powers, and began to preach only at the com- 
mand of his superior, and in the little dining room at Erfurt, 



INTRODUCTION 17 

the spirit of preaching grew upon him, and soon he was urged 
to preach in the town church of Wittenburg. This was in the 
second decade of the sixteenth century, about two years before 
he broke with the Eomish church. 

It is undoubtedly true that Luther's preaching, more than 
any other force, was the main instrumentality in making the 
Reformation a success. His preaching was characterized by 
certain qualities which made it almost irresistible to the masses, 
and his was a movement from the bottom towards the top. It 
was a plea for freedom of thought, freedom of speech and the 
right of individual interpretation, and consequently it was a 
people's movement, and not a movement of the clergy or the 
ruling powers. 

Luther inspired the kind of preaching for the whole period. 
Every sermon of his had at least three distinct marks, viz.: 
Boldness, Simplicity and Directness. He had no fear before 
his eyes except the fear of God. He could be easily under- 
stood, and his constant aim was to reach the human heart. 
These qualities made his preaching immensely popular, and 
finally brought all Germany practically to his feet. Of course 
there were other men and other influences at work; but it was 
Martin Luther, with his tongue of fire, like a second Athana- 
sius against the whole world, and like Athanasius, he won out 
in the end. 

It is not needful to speak of other preachers of this period. 
Great names could be mentioned in Germany, France, England, 
Scotland, and other countries who were conspicuous in the 
pulpit, but my space forbids any special notice of these. It is 
sufficient to say that preaching had received a new impulse 
and again became a great power for good. 

FIFTH PERIOD 

This period extends from the death of Luther (1546) to the 
beginning of the nineteenth century. For about 300 years 
preaching was very irregular in its development. The whole 
of Europe was more or less convulsed during this time. The 
thirty years' war, from a political and social point of view, 



18 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

had considerable influence on the pulpit. Then there was the 
war of doctrines. Protestantism had to defend itself not only 
against the Roman Catholic church but it was soon divided 
within itself into antagonistic religious parties, and these were 
as bitter in spirit towards one another as the opposition to the 
common enemy, — the Eoman Catholic church. This spirit 
was fed on Dogmatism with respect to creeds and confessions 
of faith, and strongly reacted upon the preaching of the period. 
In most places the pulpit echoed polemics, instead of the gos- 
pel, and in all places the preaching was cold, formal and life- 
less. It was all head and no heart, while the people generally 
lost what little interest they had in the pulpit of the times. 
Some great souls still maintained the best ideals of preaching, 
and did valiant service in counteracting the dominant influ- 
ences. But even the eloquence of John Knox, the learning of 
Calvin, the earnestness of Richard Baxter, and the preaching 
of the Illuminums in Germany, could do very little in turning 
the tide of the dogmatic spirit which prevailed all over Europe. 

During the latter part of the seventeenth century and the 
beginning of the eighteenth, Pietism, led by August Hermann- 
Francke, had considerable influence in Germany, in effecting a 
reaction from the extreme of Dogmatism, which so long domi- 
nated the preaching after the death of Luther. But Pietism 
went too far in the opposite direction. It practically made 
religion to consist of feeling only, and therefore gave little at- 
tention to questions of the head. Later on Count Zinzendorf 
and the Moravian brethren continued the Pietism of Francke 
in a modified form, and the Moravians taught the Wesleys 
"the way of the Lord more perfectly" and thereby enabled 
them to correct the Mysticism of William Law, and to con- 
tribute to the Evangelical Revival many things that helped to 
make it a success. The Wesleys borrowed from the Moravians 
the Watch Night service, the whole church as a missionary 
society, the Love Feast, the use of Christian songs, and some 
other elements, since belonging to the Methodist system. 

It will be seen that toward the end of the Fifth Period, 
preaching had swung around from the Dogmatism of the 
schools, and the classic finish of the French pulpit, to the other 



INTRODUCTION 19 

extreme — the subjective reign of Pietism though at times modi- 
fied by certain reactionary influences. Nevertheless, the swing 
was far enough in most cases to make religion a matter of the 
heart to the exclusion of the head. The historical aspects of 
Christianity were reduced to a minimum, while the emotional 
nature was emphasized far beyond the point of safety. 

The causes which produced this state of things are not far to 
seek. The first of these was the activity pi the Roman 
Catholic propaganda by the Jesuits. Germany and England 
were the only influential Protestant countries in Europe, and 
the effort at this time by the Jesuits was to Romanize these 
two countries, and especially Germany. Hence, about the 
middle of the eighteenth century, numerous Jesuit missionaries 
were turned loose on the country who, by their insidious 
influence, did much to make infidels where they could not 
make Catholics. But a still greater influence came from the 
universities. These became hotbeds of infidelity. The pulpits 
followed the universities, and consequently, the preaching was 
either saturated with the skepticism of the times, or else, for 
the most part, it broke with the historical and made religion 
simply a matter of feeling. 

SIXTH PERIOD 

At the beginning of the nineteenth century Schleiermacher 
was the great preacher of Germany. He was educated by the 
Moravians, and he imbibed much of their Pietism ; but he made 
a new use of the' heart life. Seeing, as he did, that even 
Methodism, though a reformed Pietism, was constantly in 
danger of making religion wholly an emotional matter, he 
proposed an irenicon between Dogmatism and Pietism. His 
proposal was not much different from the more modern school 
represented by such men as Harnack, Sabatier and Loisy. In 
Schleiermacher 's system of religion the authority is not placed 
in Scripture, nor is it placed in the pure reason, but in the 
religious feeling which he held to be inherent in man, but 
quickened and unfolded in Christianity. This view is funda- 
mental in all his thinking. While holding to the main features 



20 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

of the historical aspects of Christianity, he has in fact little 
use for either Testament, and especially the Old, so far as 
authority is concerned. 

Of course this is no fair statement of his whole system, but 
simply refers to the question of authority. He held to neither 
Rationalism, nor to the scriptural testimony, but to the feeling 
that the Christian religion is true because it completely harmo- 
nizes with the inner consciousness, which is the measure of 
right and wrong. 

His teaching became dominant in Germany, popular in 
England and influential in America. Perhaps it was not gen- 
erally understood that he was the author of the prevailing 
views, but his ideas for a time spread rapidly and at the begin- 
ning of the nineteenth century had reached America, where 
they received new increments until, in the early days of the 
century, the combined product resulted in those strange reli- 
gious frenzies, called the " Jerks," which prevailed in several 
parts of the United States. 

AMERICAN INFLUENCE 

At this time America had begun to have considerable influ- 
ence in the national life of the world. Situated as it is, right 
on the road of the progress of the religion of Christ around the 
world, it seems providential that it became a sort of melting 
pot for all religious views and the final resultant will be a 
united church with a forward march to the conquest of the 
nations lying westward. But America had to experience its 
Gethsemane and Calvary, before it could reach its final resur- 
rection. It passed through its Gethsemane during the reign of 
Puritanism when church and state were practically united; 
and it passed through its crucifixion during its Civil War. Its 
resurrection is still in progress. 

The American pulpit has kept pace with these steps of 
progress. We have seen that it was at a very low ebb at the 



INTRODUCTION 21 

beginning of the nineteenth century. But, as Thomson ex- 
presses in his fine lines on Providence: 

"From seeming evil still educing good; 
And better thence again and better still, 
In infinite progression. ' * 

THE COMING OF THE CAMPBELLS 

In the year 1807, Thomas Campbell came to America, bear- 
ing letters from the Presbyterian Association of which he was 
a member, and having joined the Presbytery of Chartiers, located 
chiefly in the County of Washington, Pa., he soon perceived 
the sad condition of religion in the States, and was accord- 
ingly moved to write an appeal to the divided Christendom 
which he found, urging them to cease their warfare upon one 
another and return to the ''unity of the spirit in the bond of 
peace." 

His son, Alexander, having been left behind, as a student in 
Glasgow University, followed in 1809, arriving just in time to 
read the proof sheets of his father's remarkable "Declaration 
and Address," which was soon published as their joint con- 
clusion regarding what should be done to heal the divisions of 
Christians. Alexander was not more than 23 years old at this 
time, and yet at that early age he began the defense of the 
principles which his father had formulated, and ever after- 
wards he was the acknowledged leader of the religious move- 
ment which finally became known as the "Reformation of the 
Nineteenth Century," representing that communion of Chris- 
tians historically called "Disciples" or "Churches of Christ." 

It was in these early days that Mr. Campbell developed 
those remarkable gifts of speech for which he was so justly 
distinguished. He was kept busy explaining and advocating 
the great movement which had for its object the restoration of 
primitive Christianity in its purity and simplicity, its facts, 
doctrine and life. 

In order to study Mr. Campbell as a preacher, it is necessary 
to know something of him as a theologian. His religious sys- 
tem completely dominated his preaching, and did much to 



22 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

make him one of the greatest preachers of the nineteenth 
century. If he had been the pastor of a church in some im- 
portant center of influence, such as Boston, New York, Phila- 
delphia, or Cincinnati, he would doubtless be known as much 
for his pulpit work as he is for his voluminous writings. His 
pastoral preaching was done in Bethany, an obscure village, 
with few hearers of special culture; but a number of college 
students attended his ministry, and we are indebted mainly to 
these for what we know about Mr. Campbell's regular preach- 
ing. These students could not hear with patience any one else 
in the Bethany pulpit. 

Just how he struggled with the conditions which held him 
at Bethany are clearly indicated in the following remarkable 
letter addressed to the elders of the Christian Church, at Cin- 
cinnati, Ohio (now the Central), in answer to a call from that 
church. The letter reads like an Apostolic Epistle, and should 
be useful to ministers of the present day in both the spirit of 
its splendid courtesy and its high sense of duty: 

Bethany, Va., Dec. 6, 1837. 
To Bros. Donogh, Lawson, Crane and Bay, elders of the congregation in 
Cincinnati, grace, mercy and peace be multiplied from, God our Father, 
and Jesus Christ our Lord: 

Dearly Beloved Brethren. — Your favor of the 1st ulto. has been under 
consideration for some time. I trust you will not regard my delay in 
answering it as either neglect or disrespectful. My frequent visits from 
home, my many duties at home, and the weight of the communication with 
which you have honored me, are my excuses for my delay in replying. 

To be so unanimously invited by the whole church of Christ in your city 
to settle among you, and to co-operate with you in the great work of the 
Lord, imposes upon me a more serious consideration of the matter of my 
removal from Bethany than I have hitherto paid to it. All that you say 
concerning local advantages I duly appreciate, and concur, in judgment 
with you, on the whole premises. 

I have, moreover, more partialities for your city and society than any 
one west of the mountains, and I might, indeed, add, east of the moun- 
tains. I do regard it as destined to be a very conspicuous radiating-point 
for good or for ill, placed in the midst of this immense valley. 

Still, with all the pleasing and promising prospects before me in that 
location, and, above all, the contemplated happiness that I would enjoy 
in your society, together with the enlarged prospects of personal usefulness, 



INTRODUCTION 23 

I can not make up my mind to pull up my stakes and emigrate from this 
mountainous country and all the advantages of retirement for study and 
reflection and extensive usefulness which it has hitherto afforded me. 

You know, beloved brethren, that I travel much — that I have a large 
circuit — many brethren, many friends occasionally to re-enforce — and to 
receive many communications. Now, all these do necessarily forbid my 
cultivating, with much assiduity, any particular spot. I do not, however, 
say that my present field of labor will always be such an one as I ought 
to occupy. The time may come that a narrower circuit will command my 
energies. Yet, in my judgment, that day is not yet. 

I have committed all these matters to the Lord; I wait his bidding. I 
use my own reason, while I follow the openings of his providence. 

When I see my way open, I will take up my tent, but, at present, I am 
not persuaded that, with a reference to the whole public good, I ought to 
change my location. 

You have the first and strongest claim upon me when that day arrives, 
should it ever come. 

Please, brethren, lay the matter in the most acceptable manner before 
all the holy brethren, with my most cordial salutation in the Lord, and may 
the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and bless you and give you peace. 

To him be glory forever. 

Most affectionately, your brother in the hope of eternal life, 

A. Campbell. 

Mr. Campbell's sermons, during his preaching tours, are 
classed among the greatest ever heard by the immense audi- 
ences which met him at every place. Some of his most strik- 
ing sermonic characteristics were as follows: 

(I) His sublime faith in the word of Cod. This is fore- 
shadowed in the " Declaration and Address," the third article 
of which says: "Nothing ought to be inculcated upon Chris- 
tians as articles of faith ; nor required of them as terms of com- 
munion, but what is expressly taught and enjoined upon them 
in the Word of Cod. Nor ought anything to be admitted, as 
of Divine obligation, in their church constitution and manage- 
ments, but what is expressly enjoined by the authority of our 
Lord Jesus Christ and his apostles upon the New Testament 
Church; either in expressed terms or by approved precedent." 
Now this paragraph is the keynote to all his preaching. With 
Schleiermacher, he agreed that the religion of Christ just fits 
the human heart, but he went further than did the German 
theologian. Mr. Campbell's preaching comprehended the whole 



24 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

man — body, soul and spirit, showing that in the gospel mes- 
sage there is light for the head, love for the heart and action 
for the body. Mr. Campbell believed as much in a heart re- 
ligion as did the Pietists, but he held that the heart does not 
exhaust the whole man, nor does love exhaust the whole gospel 
message — for the eyes of the understanding must be opened 
and then the final act by which both love and faith are made 
manifest must be through the body. The Lord must be obeyed 
as well as believed in and loved. Faith is first of all a matter 
of the intellect — a belief of testimony; but when it reaches the 
heart it results in repentance and this leads to the definite act 
of Baptism. Hence the whole gospel message contains some- 
thing to believe, something to feel, and something to do, and 
until it reaches the last the whole of the man has not been 
included. 

This was a new gospel metaphysics and it was also quite a 
new style of preaching, and yet it was as old as Peter's sermon 
at Pentecost. In that great sermon Peter preached just three 
things, first, that men are sinners; second, that Jesus is the 
Savior of sinners, and third, how this Savior saves these sin- 
ners. He did this by impressing the historical facts upon his 
hearers' minds and hearts and when they wanted to know 
what to do, he tells them to repent and be baptized. 

This preaching was both comprehensive and simple. It in- 
cluded all the facts of the Gospel, and at the same time co- 
ordinated them into perfect harmony with man's tripartate 
nature, so that the gospel plan exactly fits the man addressed. 

In dealing with these gospel facts, Mr. Campbell always 
appealed to the Scriptures, and for every conclusion he de- 
manded a "Thus saith the Lord." He was no slave to a 
Procrustean theory of inspiration. He recognized the difficul- 
ties of such a theory. But he contended that in the matter of 
salvation, the Scripture conditions were so plain, and so well 
certified, that the "wayfaring man though a simpleton need 
not err therein." 

In his interpretation of the Scriptures he used the inductive 
method, insisting always that single texts should not be torn 
away from their legitimate association, and forced into a 



INTRODUCTION 25 

meaning entirely different from the intention of the writer. 
He claimed that, in general, Scripture should be allowed to 
explain Scripture, and he specially deprecated any appearance 
of pedantry or display of learning in the pulpit, where every- 
thing should be real, and without the slightest affectation. He 
himself, while preaching, was the impersonification of natural- 
ness. 

It will readily be seen that Mr. Campbell's reverence for the 
Scriptures and his method of interpretation would have great 
influence in addressing a popular audience. The people like 
something definite in preaching. They do not care for the 
kind of preacher who said his sermon divided itself into three 
parts. The first part he would understand and the audience 
would not ; the second part the audience would understand, and 
he would not ; the third part neither he nor the audience would 
understand. Mr. Campbell was never guilty of that kind of 
preaching. Clearness of vision was always a prominent fea- 
ture in all his sermons. This simplicity of method, coupled 
with the fact that every conclusion was based on the testimony 
of Scripture, gave his preaching a distinct and impressive au- 
thority which was almost irresistible to the honest hearer. This 
enabled him to address audiences for several hours at a time 
without apparently wearying any one. His preaching was 
remarkably convincing, as well as very entertaining to the 
average hearer; and nothing contributed more to this power 
over assemblies than the consciousness of both speaker and 
audience that the foundation on which the speaker stood was 
as firm as the everlasting hills. 

(II) A second general characteristic of Mr. Campbell's 
preaching was his constant recognition of our Lord Jesus 
Christ as our Prophet, Priest and King. In all his sermons as 
well as in his religious system he regarded the Christ, the Son 
of the Living God, as the center and source of all that is essen- 
tial to the salvation of souls. As Prophet he gives us light, as 
Priest he gives us love — he makes intercession for us; as King 
he gives his commands and we must obey these, else why do we 
call him Lord, Lord and do not the things that he says. Other 
things might be important, but the supremacy of Christ is indis- 



26 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

pensable in any religious system that is worthy of being called 
Christian. Having personally heard most of the great preach- 
ers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, in both America 
and Europe, and also having heard Mr. Campbell preach not 
less than 150 times, I do not hesitate to say that none have 
equalled Mr. Campbell in his advocacy of the Divinity and 
supreme authority of our Lord Jesus Christ. Notwithstanding 
the number of times I heard him preach, never in a single in- 
stance did he fail to make Christ "the chief among the ten 
thousand, the one altogether lovely." He believed that all 
authority in heaven and in earth had been given to the risen 
Lord, and that whatsoever he commanded should be done and 
that his word was the end of all controversy. 

This is why his preaching was so restful and satisfactory to 
so many perplexed souls. During the early part of his min- 
istry the Baptists and Methodists were both making much of 
what was called a religious "experience," this with them was 
the evidence of pardon. But Mr. Campbell saw that this 
"experience" was at best a variable quantity, and did not give 
to the convicted soul that clear and conclusive evidence of 
pardon which is so essential in the case of those who are 
conscious of seeking the mercy of an offended God. Instead 
of relying on these transient feelings and uncertain experi- 
ences, Mr. Campbell taught that the penitent believer should 
rely on the promise of the sovereign Lord. He promised sal- 
vation, or pardon, on definitely defined conditions, and all the 
sinner had to do was to believe what the Lord has promised 
and do what he says should be done, and then pardon is just 
as sure as the divine word is sure. 

This was a new revelation to struggling souls for pardon 
and peace. Instead of trusting to their uncertain feelings, 
Mr. Campbell taught them to trust the tender, loving Christ, 
who is the same yesterday, today and forever. Nothing per- 
haps has given the Disciples more evangelistic power than 
this view of the peace that comes with obedience. 

While Mr. Campbell's preaching was always Christo-centric, 
he did not undervalue the teaching of the apostles. What 
they taught, was also Christ's teaching. This the Master fore- 



INTRODUCTION 27 

told when he promised the Comforter. He was to lead them 
into all truth, and Luke tells us that the apostles continued 
what Christ "~began both to do and to teach" while he was 
here on earth. The whole revelation was not complete dur- 
ing his personal ministry, and consequently what the apostles 
taught and did was simply an extension of Christ 's own teach- 
ing and doing, for the apostles were guided by the Holy 
Spirit which was to testify of Christ. 

In Mr. Campbell's preaching, in order to go "back to Christ" 
there was no passing over the apostles. In this journey he 
regarded the apostles as essential guides. He queried that 
if we ignore the apostles, or doubt their teaching, where are 
we? Are we not indebted to them for all we historically 
know of the Christ? And if we cannot trust to their guid- 
ance, how can we be sure that the Christ they describe is a 
trustworthy Savior? How do we know that such a Christ 
as they described ever lived on the earth and performed the 
part claimed for him? It is well known that we are shut up 
to the testimony of the apostles in respect to this whole mat- 
ter. Outside of the Bible, there are only two or three brief 
references to Christ in all the historic documents of the age, 
or near the age in which he lived here on earth, and these have 
been seriously contested as to their trustworthy character. 
"What then must we conclude? Undoubtedly if the teaching 
of the apostles is not to be depended upon, then we need 
not trouble to go back to Christ, for really then there is no 
certainty that there is any Christ to whom we can go. 

Mr. Campbell's consistency in using the whole New Testa- 
ment as containing the inspired will of Cod, added much to 
the influence of his preaching. His hearers were not troubled 
with difficulties in respect to the truthfulness of the four 
gospel narratives and the doubtful teaching of the epistles. Both 
of these stood or fell together. The Christ of the epistles was 
the same with him as the Christ of the four records, but the 
former was a further development of the latter, as this de- 
velopment included his body, the Church. 

It is true Mr. Campbell did not preach a scholastic Christ 
whose physics and metaphysics have been the source of end- 



28 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

less confusion ever since the Council of Nice, but instead of 
this cold, abstract, and philosophical Christ he preached a 
tender, loving, personal Christ, one who is touched with the 
feeling of our infirmities, and who sympathizes with all our 
needs, who is our great teacher, our merciful intercessor and 
our wise and powerful ruler. 

It was this preaching of the personal Christ that gave to 
Mr. Campbell's sermons their principal charm. It is easy for 
us to believe a fact, to be interested in a philosophy, but we 
cannot love these, and yet the redeemed soul must have some- 
thing to love, and this is abundantly supplied in the personal 
Christ. It is this personal aspect of the religion of Christ 
which makes it fit the crying needs of the human heart. 

There is one question of which we never tire. "We discuss 
science, politics, theology, etc., etc., and grow weary of what 
seems heartless and soulness; but we are always ready for any 
earnest inquiry into the claims and character of "Jesus who 
is called Christ." Hundreds of books are written every year 
concerning him, countless articles in magazines and journals 
speak of his matchless name, and yet there is no sign that the 
people are losing interest in the theme, and that therefore it is 
necessary to change to something else. On the contrary the 
interest is evidently increasing. Not only is the name of Jesus 
indissolubly associated with the literature of the entire civi- 
lized world, but from every church and Bible school, as well 
as from most homes where the Bible is respected, comes the 
certain testimony that the personal Christ is a fountain from 
which flows a healing stream, so fresh and blessed that millions 
of sad and aching hearts find in it a remedy for all their cares 
and anxieties. No wonder his followers do not tire of him. 
Only he can give them the help they need. In prosperity or 
adversity alike he is precious. In him "we know both how to 
be abased and how to abound, everywhere and in all things 
we are instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to 
abound and to suffer need. "VYe can do all things through 
Christ who strengthens us." 

Is it to be wondered that Mr. Campbell's preaching was 



INTRODUCTION 29 

popular when it was constantly a plea for the supreme au- 
thority of this gracious, comforting, personal Christ? 

(Ill) Mr. Campbell's preaching included all the elements of 
the Gospel scheme. He was no scrap doctor. There were no 
"alones" in his religious system. When the Scriptures say 
that we are " saved by grace," he accepted that statement 
with all his heart, but when men say we are saved by grace 
alone, then he refused to give his consent. He claimed we are 
saved by faith, by calling on the name of the Lord, by the life 
of Christ, by baptism, etc., etc., but not by one of these to the 
exclusion of all others, but by all the others in co-operation. 
As well say a watch is run by the mainspring alone because 
the watch will not run without it. While the mainspring 
is the moving force, the watch is not complete, nor will it keep 
time unless all the wheels are in it, and in their proper places. 
Neither will any plan of salvation keep the time of Scripture 
teaching unless all the parts are in it and in the place assigned 
by Tiim who made the plan. To use Mr. Campbell's own 
illustration, he likened the scriptural method to the case of 
rescuing a man drowning, and a man on shore sending a man 
in a boat to the rescue. The man on shore, the boat, the man 
in the boat, the oars, and the rope thrown to the drowning 
man, are all parts of the saving process ; and a failure to sup- 
ply any one of these parts might endanger the whole effort to 
save. Just so with the different things associated with the 
justification of the sinner. Mr. Campbell wished it to be dis- 
tinctly understood that the New Testament ascribes justifica- 
tion to several things. First: It is stated that we are "justi- 
fied freely by his grace." (Eom. 3:24.) Second: We are 
"justified by his blood." (Rom. 5:9.) Third: We are "justi- 
fied by faith." (Rom. 51:; Gal. 2:16, 3:24.) Fourth: We are 
"justified by the name of the Lord Jesus." (1 Cor. 6:11.) 
Fifth: We are "justified by the Spirit of our God." (1 Cor. 
6:11.) Sixth: We are "justified by Christ." (Gal. 2:17.) 
Seventh: We are "justified by works." (James 2:27.) We 
have the most positive testimony of the Holy Spirit for saying 
that justification in some sense is connected with not less than 



30 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

seven causes or means, viz.: grace, blood, faith, his name, the 
Spirit, Christ, works. It must be evident, therefore, that 
justification cannot be "by faith only." Nor is there the 
slightest difficulty in harmonizing the various statements in 
the Divine Word. 

Along with this inclusive preaching Mr. Campbell used very 
freely what is called standpoint. With him everything should 
be considered from its legitimate point of view. This method 
required a proper division of the Scriptures. The Old Testa- 
ment has its proper place, but we must go to the New Testa- 
ment for a full revelation of the plan of salvation. We are 
now under Christ, not under Moses; we are saved by the 
gospel, not by the Mosaic laws. He made much of Dispensa- 
tional truth. The Patriarchal, Jewish and Christian dispen- 
sations are related to one another, but each has a place of its 
own, and this special function must be recognized, if we ex- 
pect to understand the Bible. 

Mr. Campbell contended that this matter of standpoint has 
much to do with any system of hermeneutics that is worthy of 
serious consideration. To harmonize the Scriptures it is in- 
dispensable. Take an illustration. In crossing the Atlantic 
ocean going east the time changes from 30 to 60 minutes every 
day, according to the speed of the vessel. Watches have to 
be moved up that much every day. Now the difficulty is not 
with the watch, nor with the sun. The reason is the change 
of standpoint, that is all. 

Just so in reference to many things in the Scriptures. For 
instance the Philippian jailor was told to believe on the Lord 
Jesus Christ, and he and his house would be saved, while 
Peter told the Pentecostians to repent and be baptized, and 
Silas told Saul to arise and be baptized. Now, why this dif- 
ference? Evidently it is owing to a difference in stand- 
point. The case of the jailor was treated from the standpoint 
of unbelief, that of the Pentecostians from the standpoint of 
impenitence and disobedience, while the case of Saul of Tarsus 
was treated from the simple standpoint of disobedience. He 
already believed and had repented. He was therefore told to 
be baptized; the Pentecostians believed and were pricked to 



INTRODUCTION 31 

the heart, and they were told to do what they had not yet 
done ; but the jailor was an unbeliever, and as the first thing 
to be overcome was his unbelief, he was told to believe on the 
Lord Jesus Christ and he should be saved. Accordingly they 
(Paul and Silas) preached to him the word of the Lord, and 
to all that were in his house, explaining other things he must 
do, and the same hour of the night he and all his were 
baptized. 

Mr. Campbell saw that in order to harmonize all these 
cases, the question of standpoint is an important factor. But 
when this is taken into account, all difficulty disappears, and 
it is no longer doubtful that faith, repentance and baptism 
are all conditions of salvation in every case where a full gos- 
pel is preached. 

Mr. Campbell claimed that a return to Apostolic practice 
would, in time, be followed by the same results as in Apostolic 
times. At present there are so many departures from this 
practice, and the people are so prejudiced that the gospel, in 
its purity and simplicity is repulsive to many because it 
makes it necessary that these prejudices must be surrendered, 
and that will take much time and patience to accomplish. 

Mr. Campbell strongly pled for Christian union, but at the 
same time he contended that the only possible union that is 
worth while must come by restoring the Apostolic faith and 
practice. This was the wire entanglement that stopped the 
rapidity of the movement on the enemies' works. This has 
always been the hindrance to the advance of the Disciples' 
contention. 

Nevertheless Mr. Campbell insisted upon the preaching of 
a full gospel, as this was the only safe preaching, since all the 
parts will be exactly equal to the whole. Hence if we trust to 
a "faith alone" or "faith only" system, we certainly take 
risks by omitting some of the parts that are unquestionably 
enjoined by the Scriptures. 

In estimating the source of Mr. Campbell's power as a 
preacher, we must not overlook his remarkable personality. 
He was the impersonification of a great manhood, and nowhere 



32 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

was this great manhood more decidedly manifested than when 
he was in the pulpit. Nature, education and circumstances 
made him a radiating center, and gave him a commanding 
influence over great audiences which was almost irresistible 
and enabled him to hold their enrapt attention for hours at a 
time. As has been truly said, "He was in the broadest and 
grandest sense of the word a discourser. His ideas flowed on 
in a perpetual stream, majestic in its stately volume, and 
grand for the width and sweeping magnificence of its current. 
With a voice that thrilled with the magnetism of great 
thoughts, and a person imposing and majestic, as his mind 
was vigorous and commanding, no one could hear and see 
him, and fail to discover that he was in the presence of one 
on whom nature had set the stamp and seal of transcendent 
greatness. ' ' 

The foregoing considerations will enable the reader to un- 
derstand some of the characteristics of the man who his- 
torically stands at the head of the pulpit from which the 
preachers represented in this volume are spiritually descended. 
Mr. Campbell furnished the type, and if the Disciple pulpit 
of today does not ring in harmony with the great preacher 
whose guidance was so scriptural, noble and powerful in its 
appeal, surely there is little hope for the Disciple pulpit of the 
future. But the sermons in this volume will justify the belief 
that Mr. Campbell's fine example has not lost its influence 
on the Disciple preachers of the present day. 

WALTER SCOTT— THE LEVERRIER OF THE 
RESTORATION 

Scott was born in Scotland, the home of philosophical and 
theological thinking, and it is rather significant that Alexan- 
der Campbell was born in Ireland where philosophy and 
theology are not specially fostered. Had this anything to do 
with their respective parts in the Restoration Movement? I 
think it had, as early impressions never leave us. But how- 
ever this may be, it is certain that Mr. Scott always made more 
of systematic theology than did Mr. Campbell. Mr. Campbell 



INTRODUCTION 33 

almost played with the great truths of the universe as units, 
Mr. Scott carefully studied their relations to one another. 
Mr. Campbell's mind was specially analytic, Mr. Scott's was 
synthetic and constructive. 

Mr. Scott was graduated from the University of Edinburgh, 
and soon after finishing his academic education, he sailed for 
America, where he was not long in finding a great field for the 
exercise of his splendid talents. Religiously he had been 
brought up in the Presbyterian faith, but he was led to re- 
examine the main features of his religious position and this 
resulted in his surrender of infant sprinkling for believer's 
baptism, and it was not long until he became fully identified 
with the Campbellian movement. He soon proved his emi- 
nent fitness for the work which had to be done. He had the 
passion for preaching, without which no man can worthily 
succeed, no matter how gifted he may be in other respects. 
He was specially qualified for evangelistic work. Mr. Camp- 
bell was not long in recognizing his splendid equipment for 
the evangelistic field, and persuaded him to attend the an- 
nual meeting of the Mahoning Association, to be held at New 
Lisbon, Ohio. At this meeting Scott was appointed a general 
evangelist. He at once entered upon his work with all the 
enthusiasm of a nature set on fire with the passion to save 
souls. But he soon met with a serious difficulty with respect to 
the matter of conversion. In dealing with penitent believers, 
he found that many of these had no definite assurance that 
their sins were pardoned. They had no doubt about their faith 
or repentance, but they were not sure that their sins were 
pardoned. They had been taught to rely on their "feelings," 
or some kind of mental states for this assurance, but finding 
these states somewhat variable, they were often most un- 
happy, and Mr. Scott began at once to search the Scriptures 
for the cause of this unrest. 

In this search Scott found that the spiritual system was dis- 
turbed by an unreckoned planet which was located between 
repentance and remission of sins, and that it was this spiritual 
Neptune that was interfering with the harmony of the planet- 



34 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

ary system of the gospel. A careful and prayerful study of 
the whole plan of salvation led him to conclude that baptism, 
when properly understood, would explain the whole difficulty, 
would bring the assurance which the penitent believer so much 
desired, and would account for the confusion in the evangelis- 
tic preaching of the day. 

Mr. Scott never claimed that he discovered that "baptism 
is for the remission of sins. ' ' This he claimed is plainly taught 
in the Scriptures and had already been taught by Alexander 
Campbell. All he claimed was to properly locate baptism in 
the gospel system, and to ask spiritual astronomers to point 
to the region where assurance is located, and they would 
surely find baptism. 

Some have objected to Mr. Scott's teaching because it comes 
dangerously near a purely mechanical system. But Scott 
would doubtless reply to this objection, by saying his gospel 
system is not responsible for any abuse of it, and furthermore, 
that there is system in all the works of God. Why then should 
objection be made to a gospel system? 

In any case Scott was sure of the importance of the empha- 
sis he had placed upon the teaching that when baptism is 
administered to a believing penitent, it is for the remission of 
sins, and being fully assured he had properly located the miss- 
ing planet in the evangelistic system, he called a meeting of 
the chief men in the new movement, in the Western Reserve, 
Ohio, where the whole matter was discussed. Mr. Campbell 
was present, and when the conference ended the new planet 
in the gospel system was distinctly seen by all present. Scott 
was overjoyed at the result, for he was fully convinced that 
it would give a new impetus to evangelistic preaching, as it 
virtually removed all difficulties. 

Nor was he disappointed. It was not long until much of 
the Western Eeserve in Ohio was on fire with the new idea. 
The people immediately saw that the place which baptism 
scripturally occupied was reasonable and exactly fitted in and 
harmonized with all the conditions of the gospel system. It 
made evident the fact of Mr. Campbell's psychology that the 



INTRODUCTION 35 

gospel is adapted to and comprehends the whole man — the body, 
as well as the head and heart, baptism being the overt and 
bodily act by which our faith and repentance are definitely 
co-ordinated with a complete surrender to the Divine Will. 
This act enables the penitent believer to be assured as to when 
and where his sins are pardoned. This lifted the process of 
conversion out of the sphere of doubtful psychological conclusions 
and made assurance to rest on the plain promises of God's Word. 

This place assigned to baptism is, in the opinion of the writer, 
the most important contribution made by the early Disciples to 
the Restoration Movement. It is not only important as regards 
evangelistic work, but is also very important in dealing with 
both the subject and action of baptism. If baptism has no 
vital place in the plan of salvation, why should one be much 
concerned when and how it is administered? But when occupy- 
ing the place Mr. Scott assigned to it, the when and how is all 
important. 

Mr. Scott's view of the design of baptism has strongly influ- 
enced the preaching of the Disciples ever since he first gave 
it practical efficiency in his evangelistic work in Ohio. It is 
also probably true that no other Soteriological contention of the 
Disciples has been more bitterly opposed by some of the denomi- 
nations than that of "baptism for the remission of sins." But 
it is well to understand that this opposition is largely owing 
to a misconception as to what baptism really is. 

When the Disciples, following Mr. Scott's teaching, insisted 
on "baptism being for the remission of sins" the usual reply 
was that there is no efficacy in water to wash away sins, thereby 
making water practically the only thing to be considered in 
baptism. But water is only one of the things belonging to 
baptism. The death, burial, and resurrection of Christ are 
under it; the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit over it; 
faith, repentance, and confession before it; and remission of 
sins, gift of the Holy Spirit, and the hope of eternal life after 
it. Water is simply the element in which the baptism takes 
place, and is, therefore, not the baptism as a whole, but only a 
part of it. Strictly speaking, baptism is the proper action, 



36 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

while all other things belonging to it should be considered as 
accessories, but evidently necessary. The failure of any of 
these to be present would endanger the validity of the baptism. 
While the Disciples have very generally associated remission 
of sins with baptism, in doing so they have assumed that bap- 
tism means everything that is ascribed to it in the Scriptures. 
Of course, an incorrect view as to what baptism is, would 
make the Disciples' contention simply absurd, but when im- 
mersion and all that they contend for is clearly understood, 
it is evident that their position is in harmony with the teaching 
of Scripture and the practice of the Apostles. Disciples do not 
teach, they never did teach, that baptism, even when it is con- 
sidered from its full import, ever procures remission of sins. 
They have always taught that, in the final analysis, the blood 
of Christ is what washes away sins, and consequently this 
blood is the procuring cause of our salvation. Nevertheless, 
they have taught that we must come in contact with that 
blood in order to secure the efficiency of it; and as Christ shed 
his blood in his death, we must come to where he shed his 
blood, in order to meet the blood in its cleansing power. The 
apostle Paul says that "as many as were baptized into Christ 
were baptized into his death," and consequently in this bap- 
tism they would come in contact with the cleansing blood. 
Disciples have always been very careful to discriminate be- 
tween a logical cause and an occasion. To illustrate this point, 
it is only necessary to say that the cause of the loud explosion in 
a gun is not simply the pulling of the trigger. This pulling of 
the trigger is the last apparent cause or occasion of the explosion. 
There are several other things that are antecedent to the pull- 
ing of the trigger, and that are absolutely essential before the 
explosion can take place. Among these antecedents may be 
mentioned the quality of the powder, the form of the gun 
barrel, the proper arrangement of the percussion cap and 
powder, the existence of a surrounding atmosphere, etc., etc. 
Any of these conditions being absent, the loud report of the 
gun might not occur. 

Now there must be the proper antecedents of baptism, such 
as the blood of Christ, faith, repentance, etc., before baptism 



INTRODUCTION 37 

itself can be worth anything whatever. But when these ante 
cedents exist, the baptism is the occasion, or to use the figure 
already introduced in the case of the gun, baptism is the trigger, 
which, when pulled, brings into active exercise the efficient causes 
which are essential to salvation. 

It might appear to some that, after all, baptism is an essen- 
tial part of the whole plan of salvation, and consequently, if 
the trigger is not pulled, or if baptism does not take place, no 
result will follow. Surely no result will follow in harmony 
with the whole plan, but in the case of the gun the explosion can 
take place without pulling the trigger at all, as there are other 
ways of firing the gun without using the regular method, 
though in such cases we would depart from the plan upon 
which the gun is made. When Disciples have advocated bap- 
tism, with its proper antecedents, as the means by which re- 
mission of sins is secured, they always are to be understood as 
referring to the whole regular plan of salvation as taught in 
the Holy Scriptures. They have always admitted that God 
may forgive sins in exceptional cases without baptism, but 
that baptism is included in the regular plan as taught by Christ 
and illustrated in the practice of the Apostles. 

Thus when the Disciples' position, as presented by Mr. Scott, 
is understood, the charge against them that they teach a water 
salvation is not only absurd, but actually false, and ought not 
to be repeated by anyone who has a proper respect for the 
truth of history. 

Mr. Scott had a philosophical mind, and this led him to deal 
in great generalizations. He divided the whole scheme of 
redemption into three parts, viz. (1) Evangelical, (2) Transi- 
tional, (3) Ecclesiastical. 

But as regards sinners and sin he said that at least six things 
are to be considered — the love of sin, the practice of it, the 
state of it, the guilt of it, the power of it, and the punishment 
of it. The first three relate to the sinner ; the last three to sin. 
Faith is to destroy the love of sin, repentance to destroy the 
practice of it, baptism the state of it, remission the guilt of it, 
the Holy Spirit the power of it, the resurrection the punish- 
ment of it. 



38 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

This style of presenting truth was at least intelligible to the 
popular mind, and it is not surprising that it carried con- 
viction to many who had almost despaired of reaching any 
satisfactory conclusions in regard to the Christian religion. 

In addition to the importance of the design of baptism, Scott 
made at least two other noteworthy contributions to the Resto- 
ration Movement. One of these was the personal element in the 
preaching of the gospel, instead of giving abstract doctrines 
which in the early part of the nineteenth century were more or 
less the warp and woof of almost every sermon. With Scott 
all gospel preaching is summed up in the confession which 
Peter made when he said that Jesus is "the Christ, the Son 
of the Living God;" hence he is "our righteousness, and sanc- 
tification, and our redemption, that according as it is written, 
he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." The other contri- 
bution was in differentiating the church from the gospel mes- 
sage which is specially intended for those outside of the 
church — aliens, or those who have never been converted. In 
other words, he insisted upon a proper division of the Scrip- 
tures, giving to saint and sinner their respective portions in 
due season. 

Scott was not only a great preacher (as an evangelist, per- 
haps the greatest of his day), but he was also an able and grace- 
ful writer. Under the name of "Philip" he wrote some of the 
ablest articles in the Christian Baptist, during the seven years 
of its existence; and when the Millennial Harbinger took the 
place of the Baptist, in 1830, Mr. Scott continued to write for 
it, until he started periodicals of his own. His book, entitled 
"The Gospel Restored " should be read and mastered by all 
young men who are preparing for the ministry, if they wish to 
get a clear conception of the gospel message in all of its 
relations. There is nothing better for this purpose in all the 
literature of the Disciples. 

Among his personal characteristics may be mentioned his 
simplicity, his honesty, his great earnestness, his humility and 
his faithfulness. 

Mr. Scott is rightly classed with Thomas and Alexander 
Campbell, and Dr. Robert Richardson as constituting the "Big 



INTRODUCTION 39 

Four" of the Reformation in its early days. Barton W. Stone 
properly belonged to another group, viz.; Stone, John Smith, 
John Rogers and John T. Johnson. Each one of these great 
men had his distinctive place, and Scott was the Man of Vision, 
and organizer of the spiritual system, so as to account for every 
discord that might appear in all its parts. It was his place 
also to find a remedy for the least disturbance of the harmony 
of God's perfect plan of salvation. 

In the very beginning of his manhood he became much inter- 
ested in the study of music. He had the musical temperament 
and also a sweet musical voice. With these he united a prac- 
tical imagination and a marvelous facility in the use of words 
and phrases. His musical talent dominated him in many re- 
spects and helped to make him a philosopher more than a 
theologian. With him nothing was perfect that did not spell 
harmony. The seven notes of the Diatonic Scale were used 
i?i all his reasoning, whether he was conscious of it or not. As 
these notes must always be in the right place to make harmony, 
so everything in philosophy and religion must have its proper 
musical setting. Equally true was it as regards the chromatic 
scale. The seven colors of light must be in their proper places, 
and proportions in order to harmonize in making what we call 
white light. Scott could not see why all this is true in nature 
and not true in grace. Consequently he carried this kind of 
thinking into his study of the Bible, and it became a dominant 
factor in shaping what he called the "plan of salvation." He 
was truly the Leverrier of the Reformation. 

SPURGEON, PARKER, AND OTHERS 

The two men who impressed themselves upon the pulpit, 
during the Sixth Period, more than any others, were C. H. 
Spurgeon and Dr. Joseph Parker. Their preaching differed 
very widely in many respects. Perhaps neither of them has 
had as much influence through his printed sermons as Dr. 
Alexander McLaren and Canon Liddon, but Spurgeon and 
Parker had no rivals in their spoken sermons. It may be well 
to give my own impressions having heard them on the same day. 



40 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

It was at the regular Thursday services, in July, 1882, Parker 
in the morning and Spurgeon at night. 

At the City Temple, in the morning, the service was simplicity 
itself. An old-fashioned, short-meter hymn, with prayer, fol- 
lowed by another hymn, the sermon, a concluding hymn, and 
the benediction, made up the items of a most remarkable week- 
day religious service. The singing was hearty, but Dr. Parker 
did not seem to be satisfied with it, as he made a disparaging 
allusion to it during the sermon. The congregation nearly 
filled the main body of the Temple, and was evidently composed 
of a very thoughtful class of people. Not a few were business 
men, who had run away for an hour to seek rest in the helpful 
instruction of the distinguished preacher's sermon; and we 
cannot doubt that they found, to a great degree, the help for 
which they were seeking. Many women were also present. 
Some of these were doubtless Christian workers from various 
parts of the metropolis; but by far the greater number were 
mothers and wives who were there to seek strength for their 
responsible duties in the home circle. There was a large pro- 
portion of young men, many of whom were probably studying 
with the view to entering the ministry, and were there for the 
instruction and intellectual stimulus which Dr. Parker 's ser- 
mons are sure to impart. There were also several persons who 
were evidently American travellers, and who had come to the 
service with the view of " doing" the Temple as one of the 
things which cannot be omitted while sight-seeing in London; 
and it would seem, notwithstanding the somewhat questionable 
motive which may have brought these there, that Americans, 
visiting England, could not have done better than to spend 
their Thursday mornings listening to one of Dr. Parker's ser- 
mons. They would never have failed to hear something fresh, 
vigorous, and helpful, — qualities which Americans are always 
specially delighted with, wherever or in whomsoever found. 

The sermon on the day mentioned was wonderfully sugges- 
tive, and in many parts deeply impressive. It had the ring of 
the true metal. It was full of the lofty spirit of consecration 
and pervaded by a sympathy with human struggle which sweet- 
ened every sentence and sent a joyful benediction to every wait- 



INTRODUCTION 41 

ing heart. The argument was for the necessity of the ordinary 
means which have been appointed for spiritual development; 
and about this thought were gathered striking illustrations 
from the wide field of human experience, as found in the Word 
of God and in the history of our race. Altogether the ser- 
mon was one of Dr. Parker's best. 

In the evening Mr. Spurgeon's great Tabernacle was nearly 
full. The audience was made up of the middle and lower 
classes, many having with them their traveling bags, who had 
evidently halted an hour before going away from or returning 
to their homes. Others seemed to be regular attendants, who 
found in the preacher's sermons nourishing food after the 
labors of the weary day. All seemed thoughtful, devout and 
earnest. 

The service here was also very simple, but it was as hearty 
as it was simple. The singing was without musical accompani- 
ment, and each stanza of the hymn was read by Mr. Spurgeon 
before it was sung by the congregation. The exposition which 
preceded the sermon was clear and practical, while the sermon 
itself was a capital illustration of Mr. Spurgeon 's peculiar power 
of making the most out of a single sentence of Scripture. It 
seemed to me no one but Mr. Spurgeon would ever have had 
suggested to his mind the line of thought pursued; but it all 
appeared natural enough in the hands of the great preacher, 
as he unfolded the teaching of the text in regard to the prac- 
tical duties of life. It brought to mind the incident related of 
Columbus, who showed some of his friends how to make an egg 
stand on end by cracking the shell. It was easy enough to his 
friends after they had seen how it was done. It was plain to see, 
as the preacher went on with his discourse, that all his lines of 
thought were clearly suggested by the text; but before he be- 
gan to speak no one would have dreamed that such was the 
way to do it. 

The sermon was as different as possible from the one heard 
in the morning, but it was precisely what one would expect 
from perhaps the most popular preacher in the world. Nor 
was it difficult to account for that popularity. Simplicity, 
earnestness, adaptation, directness, and clearness, were marked 



42 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

features of every sentence ; but above all there was entire f or- 
getfulness of self and a complete biding behind the Cross, a 
deep sense of dependence upon God for all that we have and 
are, and a most profound reverence for the Divinely inspired 
Word. With such an analysis in the mind it was not difficult 
to account for Mr. Spurgeon's great popularity and power as a 
preacher of the gospel. 

Leaving the Tabernacle I felt more than ever convinced that 
the grand old gospel, which Peter preached at Pentecost and 
Paul at Mars' Hill, is just as powerful as it ever was, and that 
whatever pulpit will sound out this ' ' Old, old story, ' ' with sim- 
plicity, faithfulness, earnestness, and with a firm reliance for 
blessing on him from whom we receive every good and perfect 
gift, will be a center of great spiritual power. 

There are other great preachers belonging to this period who 
were shining lights in the pulpit. But I need mention only a 
few of these. F. W. Eobertson of Brighton, England, and R. W. 
Dale of England were powerful factors in influencing the 
preaching of the nineteenth century. In this country such 
preachers as Beecher, Finney, Edwards and Gordon need no 
introduction to Americans. 

SEVENTH PERIOD 

The twentieth century brought us to a somewhat unique 
period in respect to preaching. Preaching today is unlike what 
it was in any other period of church history. There are several 
reasons for this. 

(1) The decay of creedal influence has had a decided effect 
on the character of preaching. The pulpit is practically free 
from the bondage of human creeds. The average preacher no 
longer fears the denominational whip. That instrument has 
ceased to be a potent factor in controlling the utterances of 
the pulpit. True, it still has a name to live by but it is really 
dead. This fact is productive of evil as well as good. Much of 
the evil comes from magnifying its importance. The cry of 
danger is often not much more than vox prateria nihil — voice 
and nothing else. 



INTRODUCTION 43 

(2) The union sentiment which is so prevalent at this time is 
doing much to change the character of preaching. For some 
time preaching has ceased to be doctrinal in most of the pul- 
pits. This fact is largely in deference to the prevailing union 
sentiment. But there is danger in carrying this feeling too far. 
The union sentiment is very precious, but for this very reason 
it is easily injured. There is nothing more beautiful than the 
desire for Christian union, and this is why we must handle it 
carefully. That flower by the wayside was very beautiful, but 
the frost came and it faded under the stroke of the North King; 
while many less comely things were not injured. Death loves 
a shining mark. The fruit that tempted our first parents was 
first beautiful to the eye; second, pleasant to the taste; and 
third, imparted a certain kind of wisdom. The pulpit should 
guard against this whole trio of temptations. A beautiful 
union sentiment should not be allowed to pervert the Apostolic 
injunction so as to make it read: "We must become all things 
to all men that by all means we may he nothing." A spineless 
gospel will not save the world, though it should be proclaimed 
in the interest of so beautiful a cause as Christian union. This 
age needs such preaching as was done by Peter, Stephen, and 
Paul — preaching filled with convictions delivered with cour- 
age. Even a union that cannot bear the sunlight of truth 
would be worse than the present divisions. 

(3) Economical and social questions are having their influ- 
ence on the pulpit of the twentieth century. This is as it 
should be, but this influence must be carefully watched. The 
economic problem is probably the most influential factor to be 
considered. A church value is measured largely by the amount 
of money it raises for religious work. The character of the 
altar upon which the gift is offered has little or nothing to do 
with many financial schemes ; and yet the teaching of the Scrip- 
tures is, it is the altar that sanctifies the gifi. Our missionary 
conventions emphasize and applaud the amount of money 
raised rather than the number of souls saved and churches 
built up in the most holy faith. 

Christian religion is eminently social in its character. Christ 
said to his sorrowing disciples: "Lo, I am with you, even to the 



44 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

end of the world." Where two or three are gathered together, 
he is in the midst. His socialism recognized only one Master 
and all his followers are brethren. 

(4) The progress of the Sunday school idea must be reckoned 
with in any worthy study of the preaching of the present day. 
The Sunday school is one of the marvels of this remarkable age. 
The child is now the ruler of the man. The child has really 
conquered dogmatic theology. The preacher has been com- 
pelled to give up his scholastic preaching or else give up the 
children. Of course the battle is not yet quite won for the 
child, but the tendency of the times is in the direction of a 
compete victory before very long. 

This tendency may carry us too far away from exegetical 
preaching by ultimately landing the pulpit into a religious zone 
where only goody goody pietism nourishes; or where littleness 
is larger than bigness in all that relates to Christian character. 

(5) Closely akin to the foregoing is the song service. This 
has already come to be a prominent feature in many churches. 
In these churches the music is of more importance than the 
preaching. But why should this be so? In Mr. Spurgeon's 
lifetime he preached to 5,000 or 6,000 every Lord's Day and he 
had no choir at all. The song service was not neglected but 
the sermon had the chief place. In many of our present day 
churches the organ and the choir have the first place, and 
this makes it impossible for the preacher to do his best, being 
conscious that he is practically playing second fiddle to the 
"Stormy Petrel" that plays and sings for the church. 

(6) The demand for short sermons is compelling preachers 
to reckon with the time limit to such an extent as to make it 
impossible for them to preach great sermons even where they 
are abundantly able. But how can the preacher help this state 
of things? The numerous announcements must be made; the 
usual hymns sung; an organ solo played; a song solo sung, etc., 
etc. At most the preacher is allowed a half hour for the de- 
livery of the most vital message that mortals ever heard; and 
worse than all he knows he must not exceed this time limit, for 
how can he hold the attention of the audience when a mental 
dinner bell is ringing? 



INTRODUCTION 45 

(7) Much of the preaching of the present time is sensational 
and lacks vision. Such preaching as that of Billy Sunday, etc., 
may be interesting to listen to but it does not feed the soul with 
the food that builds up the spiritual life. But the people cry 
for the sensational, they want something to make their ears 
tingle, and that they can taste on their tongue, like those re- 
ferred to in the Second Period of preaching. This demand does 
much to hinder the popularity of preaching that will build up 
the spiritual man. It is like drinking intoxicating beverages 
the more one has the more one wants. 

Not much of this kind of preaching has found hospitality 
among the Disciples. But in some churches the doors have 
been thrown wide open and it has been invited to come in, and 
in all such cases the churches have ceased to grow spiritually, 
though the audiences may have doubled, or even quadrupled. 

All this helps to illustrate the tendency of the times in which 
we live. Principles are eternal, methods are ever changing. 
Just now the whole world is moving towards the reign of the 
people. This tendency may make it necessary for a still more 
radical change in our church services. What if we should 
finally come to the style of the service as indicated in the 11th, 
12th, and 14th chapters of 1 Corinthians? The social tendency 
of the present day may compel some such service at the morn- 
ing meetings as was the practice in this Corinthian church. In 
that case popular preaching will be mainly confined to the 
night service, and will be chiefly exegetical. Would not this 
change conform more exactly to the primitive model than the 
hurried and half considered worship which prevails at present 
in many places at the morning services? Furthermore, is it 
possible for any preacher to preach two great sermons on the 
same day ? In short, are not our churches in danger of chang- 
ing the worship into an entertainment for the enjoyment of the 
senses, rather than the furnishing of food to feed hungry souls 
with the bread of life ? 

These suggestions are put tentatively; certainly not with 
dogmatic assurance that they would solve the preacher's prob- 
lem of the present day. Nevertheless, as the world is just now 
on the crest wave of a new age, is it not wisdom to make ready 



46 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

for the incoming tide ? And if signs are to be trusted, it seems 
at least probable that the Disciples must reform their church 
services, if they hope to lead the religious forces of the coming 
days. Many of their preachers are already in line for a decided 
change; why not all follow the Apostolic practice in this as 
well as in other things? I do not say that this practice should 
be reproduced in every detail, but the underlying principle — 
viz.: liberty — should be held sacred and illustrated in the public 
services of all the meetings of the churches. What I am con- 
tending for is a service that will enlist the co-operation of every 
Christian and that will be more distinctly worshipful than is now 
generally the case. Such a service would be decidedly helpful 
to the preacher as well as to all the members of the church. It 
may not be possible, or even desirable, for the Disciples to have a 
simple Liturgy, but if some plan could be devised by which 
every member of each congregation could be more definitely 
made an active participant in the Lord's day services than is 
at present the case, much might be gained. When the Dis- 
ciples have realized the new age which is just now dawning 
they will probably march in line with the social requirements 
of their churches. 

It will be an interesting and instructive study to those who 
care to pursue it, if they will carefully compare the sermons 
of the present volume with those of the Living Pulpit of fifty 
years ago. By so doing I think it will be evident that the 
Disciple pulpit has not degenerated in faithfulness to the word 
of the living God. This great fact is an encouraging outlook 
for the coming days. 



/ 




iV^X^. (S^Si^s^ '~^o^-y^^^^^f^^ z ^C l ^ 




ZACHARY T. SWEENEY 

THE subject of this sketch is the only preacher in the New Living Pulpit 
whose family is represented in the Old book. He is, therefore, a sort 
of connecting link between the two volumes, and hence is entitled to shake 
hands with the newcomers and give them a hearty welcome. He is the 
youngest of four brothers, all of whom have been distinguished in their 
respective fields of labor. His brother John was one of the contributors to 
the Old "Living Pulpit." 

Z. T. Sweeney was born at Liberty, Ky., in 1849, and began his public 
ministry at Paris, 111., when he was only twenty years old; and during the 
first year of his pastorate at that place, 225 were added to the church. 
In 1871 he was called to the church at Columbus, Ind., where he was mar- 
ried in 1875 to Miss Linnie Irwin, daughter of Joseph Irwin, a prominent 
business man of that city. He has also held short pastorates at other 
cities, two at Augusta, Ga., one at Richmond, Va., and one at New York; 
but his longest and most important was at Columbus, where he served 
twenty-seven years. During this time 3,600 people were added to the 
Columbus church, and when he left its active ministry it had grown from 
200 members to 1,200. He still resides at Columbus, and is pastor emeritus. 

He has also been distinguished as an evangelist. He has held as many 
as 22 protracted meetings in his home church, averaging six weeks for each 
meeting, and resulting in over 2,000 additions to the church. This feat is 
perhaps unequaled by any other minister of the Christian church. In many 
other places his evangelistic work has been very successful. The following 
extract is mainly from a life sketch in a volume entitled, "Churches of 
Christ : " "He has also dedicated 166 churches, and has never called for 
an amount of money which was not made up in response to the call, but 
once. He spent much time in holding meetings and in dedicating churches, 
also devoted a portion of each winter to lecturing upon the public platform 
and his entire time for years was taken by the Redpath Lyceum Bureau, 
of Boston, Mass. He was placed in their catalogue in an honor list of six 
or seven 'universal favorites,' holding this place along with such men as 
Russell Conwell, Thos. Dixon, Prof. J. B. DeMotte and three or four others. 
In addition to his labors as a Christian minister and lecturer he held for 
years prominent State and Government positions. His ability as a cam- 
paign orator often induced the political party with which he is affiliated 
to attempt to put him forward as a candidate both for Congress and for 
the Governorship of his adopted state, but he steadily turned a deaf ear 
to all these solicitations, and declared that he would never accept an elective 
office, believing it would interfere with his usefulness as a minister of the 

47 



48 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

gospel. The secret of his success lies in the fact that he knows what he 
desires to do, and then does it. He believes that the world gets out of the 
pathway of a man who knows where he is going. He has always been a 
power in his own community, and is best loved where he is best known." 

He was U. S. Consul General at Constantinople from 1889-1893, during 
which time he was decorated with the Turkish Order of the Osmanieh. He 
has published several books; among which may be mentioned "Under Ten 
Flags' ' and "Pulpit Diagrams.'' In 1904 he served with distinguished 
ability as president of the American Christian Missionary Society. He is 
now president of the Commission on Foreign Relations A. C. M. S. and his 
address on the Christian movement in Eussia in which he gives his experi- 
ences among the Eussian people is the most vivid and soul-stirring that it 
has ever been my pleasure to hear. For genuine touches of popular oratory 
I doubt if this has ever been excelled. 

More than anyone else, Dr. Sweeney is responsible for the new plan 
of co-operation adopted by the General Convention at its annual meet- 
ing in Kansas City, Oct., 1917. Dr. Sweeney, as chairman of the Com- 
mittee which had the matter under consideration for a year, introduced 
the report with such a tactical and eloquent address that, notwithstand- 
ing some of its features were not wholly satisfactory to all the mem- 
bers of the Convention, the plan was adopted unanimously. 

Dr. Sweeney has been an eminent success, both as an evangelist and 
pastor. It is seldom we find these two qualifications so happily and equally 
blended in one person. His sermons are characterized by great directness 
and simplicity, as well as force and comprehensiveness. One may not 
always be able to agree with him in all his conclusions, but no one of a 
sound mind can fail to understand him. Indeed his arguments are as 
clear as sunlight, and these generally carry conviction to all honest 
and unprejudiced hearers. His gifts of speech are almost marvelous, 
whether in the pulpit, on the lecture platform, or in private conversation. 
He has recently delivered a magnificent patriotic address which has cap- 
tivated his hearers in many cities. His sermons, though always fresh 
and vigorous, have in recent years mellowed into a sweetness that has 
all the fragrance of an autumn ripeness. And yet the yellow leaves, which 
hang as the decorations, detract nothing from the beauty, but rather add 
to the comeliness. In any case the fruit has a more invigorating effect 
upon weary souls than the bright flowers, laden with rich aroma, which 
made brilliant his sermons of early manhood, and which were the prom- 
ise of what is now the full corn in the ear. May these days of rich fruit- 
age be long continued. 



FIRST PRINCIPLES 

By Z. T. Sweeney 

Text. — God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in 
time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these 
last days spoken unto us by His Son. — Hebrews 1:1-2. 

AECHIMEDES said he could lift the earth from its center if 
he could find a fulcrum for his lever. In all our reasoning 
it is necessary to have some secure, fundamental fulcrum from 
which to start, or else our conclusions will be found wandering in 
space, like Noah's dove, without any secure place on which 
to rest. 

The great philosopher, Emanuel Kant, declared there were 
just three indispensable fundamental things in all our reason- 
ing, and without these we can have no starting point that will 
lead to anything worth while. These three are God, Liberty 
and Immortality. 

The present tendency of the human mind is toward bed- 
rock. In literature, science and art, men are seeking for foun- 
dation principles. The same hand of criticism that has been 
laid upon these has also touched our common faith. And there 
is not a sentiment in my heart, as there is not a principle of 
my religion, that is not in deepest sympathy with it. The time 
has gone by when the minister can hide behind his white 
choker and threaten eternal condemnation against those who 
differ from him. He must bring his case into the arena of 
modern thought and submit it to the arbitrament of human 
reason. If it is just, it will stand? if not, it will fall, and it 
ought to fall. I would spurn myself for trying to propagate 
a faith that I did not firmly believe to be founded on right, 
reason and common sense. 

The passage of Scripture which I have quoted contains the 
first principles of the gospel, the four cornerstones in the tem- 

49 



50 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

pie of Christian faith: the God thought, the Christ thought, 
the Bible thought, and the man thought. All are essential to 
the gospel. Given these, and we may have a gospel; lacking 
any one of these, and the gospel is an impossibility. Without 
further introduction, allow me to challenge your attention to 
the thought of Almighty God. It is freely admitted, on the 
threshold of our investigation, that we can never comprehend 
God, for the reason that the finite cannot comprehend the in- 
finite. Some men object to the idea of a God because they can- 
not comprehend it. They do not realize that they would object 
far more seriously to a God whom they could comprehend. A 
God whom they could comprehend, they could make and there- 
fore would not worship. While we may not comprehend God, 
we may apprehend him. To comprehend is to look all around ; 
to apprehend is to take in as much of him as we have ability to 
receive. The Christian believes that God is, for the reason that 
he believes that something is. It was De Toqueville, I believe, 
who said "every speech should begin with an incontrovertible 
proposition. ' ' I will make my incontrovertible proposition the 
statement that something is. The man who doubts that some- 
thing is, doubts that he is. The man who doubts that he is, 
doubts that he doubts. If something is, something always was, 
or the something that is came from nothing. But science, 
philosophy, and religion all agree that this is impossible. There- 
fore, the something that is, always was. That which is, and 
always was, must be either mind or matter. Which can account 
for the other, legislate upon, govern and control the other? 
Can matter do so with mind? We say, no. Can mind do so 
with matter? We say, yes. Mind can bind matter down upon 
its bands of steel, make it plunge its long iron arms into its 
pockets of power and fling out its smoke and steam on either 
side as it bears mind over the land. Mind can take matter and 
make it rear its proud beak aloft over the waters, and tramp 
the sapphired pavement of the sea like a thing of life and 
beauty. Mind can say to matter, go, and it goes; halt and it 
stops. Inasmuch as matter cannot do so with mind, and mind 
can do so with matter, we argue that that which is, and always 
was, must be mind; that mind is the God of the Christian. 



ZACHARY T. SWEENEY 51 

We here have the God idea. But is it a reality? Here all do 
not agree. Philosophy has exhausted itself in three different 
hypotheses to account for the origin of the God idea. First, 
external nature. Men looked upon the great co-ordination and 
correlation of the mighty forces without and argued a cause 
behind them. They looked upon a universe and drew the infer- 
ence of the universe maker, as we look upon a machine and 
draw the inference of the maker. Second, internal nature. 
Some men tell us that the idea of God is an efflux of highly 
organized matter, that it is a part of the plan of the soul. Such 
men prate loudly about "an honest God being the noblest work 
of man. ' ' Third, Christian philosophy says that God spake, and 
thus revealed himself. You may study until you are gray 
haired — or baldheaded, for that matter, and you will never find 
a fourth hypothesis to account for the origin of the God idea. 

Let us examine these hypotheses for a moment. If, according 
to the Locke school of philosophy, the idea of God is drawn 
from external nature, it is an idea in harmony with external 
nature, and, therefore harmonizes with nature, and therefore 
harmonizes with truth, and is, therefore, a true idea. If it 
came, according to German philosophy, from internal nature, 
it must harmonize with internal nature. But internal nature is 
only a segment of external nature. Harmonizing with internal 
nature, it harmonizes with nature at last, and therefore har- 
monizes with truth, and is, therefore, a true idea. If we reject 
both of these hypotheses, we are shut up to revelation; and the 
first declaration of revelation is, "In the beginning, God." 
Thus you may take either of these hypotheses, or all of them, 
and they land the idea of God in the realm of reality. 

"But," says an objector, "I believe in the God idea, and that 
it is a reality; but I do not believe in the God of the Christian." 
Well, let us examine the Christian's God. The Christian be- 
lieves that God is a being, independent in power, in wisdom, 
and in goodness. Let us see if we can clothe the God idea with 
these great attributes. It is an axiomatic principle that you 
cannot have an inner without an outer. Nothing is ever 
entirely inner. The moment that you think of an inner, the 
mind demands an outer. You cannot have an upper without 



52 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

an under ; a before without an after. Therefore, if you prove 
an inner you prove an outer, if you prove an upper you prove 
an under. By the same law of reasoning, you cannot have a 
dependency without an independency. Is there such a thing 
as dependency in this universe ? Everything depends, from the 
lowest form of life to man, the climax of God's creation. All 
is dependent. There must, therefore, be an independent power 
on which all this dependency hangs. That independent power 
is the power of the Christian's God. 

Again, there can be no change without an adequate cause, 
there cannot be love without a lover, hate without a hater, nor 
thought without a thinker. In the universe there is plan. 
The broad-browed and brainy scholars of the world all agree 
that the universe is full of plan. But plan is thought put into 
execution. If the universe is full of plan it is full of thought ; 
if the universe is full of thought it demands a thinker. As Dr. 
Porter of Yale says, "This universe is one mighty thought, 
back of which there is one mighty thinker, the Divine Creator. ' ' 
Lord Bacon, one of England's greatest thinkers, declares that 
he would rather believe all the fables of the Talmud and the 
Alkoran, than that this universe is without a mind, the mind 
of Deity. But a thinker is a person; the God thinker of the 
universe is therefore a person. 

Again, man has a moral sense and is adapted to it. He be- 
lieves that in everything there is either a right or a wrong. It 
cannot be both right and wrong at the same time and in the 
same place. Conscience attests man's obligation to the moral 
sense, and his adaptation to the right. Not only are these 
premises metaphysically true, but historically true as well. 
The travellers and explorers of the world attest the truth of 
these premises abroad, as our experience confirms it at home. 
There is, therefore, a moral sense and the adaptation of man to 
it. But moral adaptation demands moral design; and a moral 
design demands a moral designer of the universe to account for 
this design. A designer must have a mind to conceive his 
design, and a free will to choose between one design and an- 
other, and conscience to take cognizance of the moral quality in 
the moral design. The union of mind, free will and conscience 



ZACHARY T. SWEENEY 53 

makes a person. As all these are united in the moral designer 
of the universe he is therefore a person. Here, then, in the 
light of axiomatic certainty, we may apprehend the being of 
God and the essential attributes of his nature. Moons and stars 
may go down, and suns may set, but we shall ever behold him 
who was, and is, and ever shall be. What we thus apprehend, 
not only in the light of revelation, but in the light of logical 
induction and axiomatic truth, men have groped after for 
years. Plato was breaking his heart for this light, and Socra- 
tes was dying to know it. 

Among the legends of the old Sabean philosophy is that of 
Abraham. His ancestry lived near the Caspian sea, or the 
land of perpetual fire. The great gas wells were burning then, 
as now ; the oil was running down on the surface of the water 
and burning. And it impressed those rude people with fire 
worship. Walking forth one night with his flock, imbued with 
the religious ideas of his ancestors, as the night was throwing 
its sable curtains around the earth, one by one the stars lighted 
their silver lamps in the blue dome of the skies and smiled 
down upon the world like sweet forget-me-nots of the angels 
from out the infinite meadows of heaven. Seeing the evening 
star twinkling in the darkness more brightly than her com- 
panions of the firmament, the faith of his fathers taught him 
to say, "Oh, this shall by my God." But watching the star, 
till in the great procession of nature it had set, he turned away 
in disappointment and said, "I will have no God that sets." 
Just then the beautiful face of the night queen appeared above 
the eastern horizon, throwing a silvery veil of light and beauty 
over the earth, and Abraham's faith revived again, and he 
said, "This shall be my God." But following the star, at last 
the crescent sank beneath the western heavens; and Abraham 
turned away in disappointment and said, "I will have no God 
that sets. ' ' Just then the long arms of the king of the morning 
were thrown up the heavens, breaking down the dark pillars 
of the temple of night and building up the beautiful golden 
palace of day, throwing his fingers of light over the wet earth 
bedewed with the drops of the night, and, toying with the 
tresses of the morning, he made the sparkling grass and dewy 



54 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

flowers to look as though an angel on the previous night had 
made its toilet there and left the ground glimmering and shim- 
mering with diamonds and sapphires, rubies and pearls. And 
as Abraham gazed on this beauty and light, he said, "0 this 
shall be my God." But following moon and star, at last the 
king of day sank to rest on his western couch, and darkness 
once more brooded in the soul of Abraham, as bitterly he 
said, "I will have no God that sets, no God that sets. I will 
worship not sun, nor moon, nor star, but him who caused them, 
the cause of causes. ' ' And Abraham was an idolator no longer, 
but the friend of God and the father of the faithful. 

Mr. Darwin says, "The question whether there exists a 
creator and ruler of the universe has been answered in the 
affirmative by the highest intellects that have ever lived. An 
omniscient creator must have foreseen every consequence which 
results from the law imposed by him. An omnipotent and 
omniscient creator ordains everything." This is going even 
farther than some preachers would go. 

The great thinker upon theism, John Stuart Mill, says, "I 
think it must be allowed, that in the present state of our 
knowledge the adaptation in nature affords a large balance of 
probability in favor of creation by intelligence." 

Mr. Herbert Spencer says, "The power which the universe 
manifests is utterly inscrutable without the existence of a 
first cause. Appearance without reality is unthinkable." 

Mr. Tyndal, in his Belfast address, after speaking of the 
wonders and mysteries surrounding us, says, "Can it be there 
is no being or thing in nature that knows more about these 
matters than I do? Do I, in my ignorance, represent the 
highest knowledge of these things existing in this universe? 

"Ladies and gentlemen, the man who puts that question to 
himself, if he be not a shallow man, if he be a man capable of 
being penetrated by profound thought, will never answer the 
question by professing the creed of atheism, which has been 
so falsely attributed to me." 

Now, second, the Christian believes that God has spoken; 
he believes, therefore, in a revelation from God. As we have 
seen, he is clothed with all power, with all intelligence, and 



ZACHAKY T. SWEENEY 55 

with all goodness. He has the power to make a revelation and 
all the intelligence to do so. Moreover he is not lacking in 
goodness to make it if it is needed. There is nothing on his 
part that is against such a revelation. On the other hand the 
nature of man, as God has made it, demands a revelation. Oh, 
how often we would tear aside the dark curtain that hides 
from our impenetrable gaze the mysteries of an unlocked future 
and gaze within its dark penetralia. The first question of a 
child is, "I want to know," and it is almost the last question 
of the man. One of my fellow-citizens of the old Kentucky 
State, a man of massive brain and sublime intellect, whose 
genius could soar like the night of the condor among the Andes 
of South America, George D. Prentice, lay upon his bed of 
death. Eaising his hand he said, "Wife, I want to know — . " 
But death had stricken him, and the gigantic intellect that came 
a babe into the world, wanting to know, went out wanting to 
know. If God has created this universal desire for knowledge 
and failed to meet it, it is the only universal demand for which 
he has created no supply. 

Prof. Fiske says, ' ' Nature never throws out a prophecy which 
she does not fulfill. " Likewise, she creates no want she does 
not supply. If God has created no supply for this demand of 
the human heart, to know the things which nature does not 
teach, then the whole analogy of nature fails at its highest 
point and man is an organized lie. God made a bird to brave 
all things at the cry of her young. An animal will brave the 
rifle of the hunter at the cry of her progeny. And the mothers 
of mankind, what will they not do for their children? Will 
God put it into the heart of the mother bird, and the mother 
beast, and the mother of men, to go to their young when they 
cry, and then wrap himself up in the clouds of thick darkness, 
and refuse to hear the cry of his children when they stand in 
that darkness and reach out helpless hands and cry for help? 
If he did, he would not be a God, but a demon. What the 
divine nature necessitates and the human nature demands, 
must be, and, therefore, has been made. Beautifully has one 
of our American poets voiced this universal faith in his ode 
"To a Waterfowl." Sitting in his New England home as the 



56 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

shades of the night were falling, he heard the hoarse croaking 
bngle notes of a wild fowl as it wended its way from the 
frozen North to the rice fields of the sunny South. It set his 
heart on fire with poetic frenzy, and lifting his voice he cried, 

Whither, 'midst falling dew, 
While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, 
Far through their rosy depths dost thou pursue 

Thy solitary way? 

There is a Power whose care 
Teaches thy way along that pathless coast — 
The desert, and illimitable air — 

Lone wandering, but not lost. 

He who, from zone to zone, 
Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, 
In the long way that I must tread alone, 

Will lead my steps aright. 

Third, the Christian holds that the Bible, containing the Old 
and the New Testaments, is that revelation which God has 
made. Human history has taught that the teachings of Jesus 
Christ can solve the problem of human life, that it can bring 
humanity to its flower and fruit, that it can lead us to our 
best; and history has taught that it is the only book in the 
world that can do so. Several books have been trying to lead 
humanity out of darkness and bring it to perfection. We have 
the writings of Confucius, and they give us as the result the 
almond-eyed Chinaman. Are we ready to admit him as the ripe 
flower of humanity? Zoroaster has taught mankind, and after 
millenniums he has given us the ignorant besotted Persian. The 
best of all these books is the Koran, because nearest to the 
Scriptures. 

But as the ripe fruit of its teaching we have the bigoted, 
blood-thirsty, murdering Turk. Are we ready to say that these 
books compare in their fruitage with the New Testament? I 
once visited the great university of Mohammedanism at Cairo, 
El Azhur University. Ten thousand young men, from all over 
Mohammedandom, came there to study the Koran. When it is 
memorized, they graduate. As we entered the door of that 



ZACHARY T. SWEENEY 57 

school, our guide said to us, "Keep your hands upon your 
valuables. This is the worst place for pickpockets in all the 
city of Cairo." And yet this was the great divinity school of 
the best religion on earth, except Christianity. 

Just here I desire to say that of all the books claiming to be 
sacred books, and the religions that have grown out of them, 
there is not one, except Christianity, to which, if a man lives 
faithfully, it will not make him a meaner man than he was 
by nature. 

It has been said that in the boring of the Hoosac tunnel they 
began from both the east and the west, and when they came 
together the appertures fitted perfectly. The irresistible ' ' there- 
fore" to this is, that one mind controlled the workings of both 
these parties. If we study the cry of man upward for light, and 
the answer of God downward in the Bible, we have the same close 
fit. Count Tolstoi says, "I consider Christianity the only doc- 
trine which gives meaning to life." The infinite mind is in- 
volved in the nature of man. The same mind must be involved 
in the book that complements man and brings him to his best. 

But again, the Bible is that revelation, for Jesus Christ says 
so; and if he is divine, the book is divine. But the objector 
grounds his objection on the miraculous conception. I have 
not time to notice all the arguments against the divinity of 
Christ, but they all run at last into the one great objection, 
that he had a supernatural origin. This is true. But was there 
ever any other kind of origin? Did ever anything originate 
naturally? Nature does not know a beginning, neither does it 
know an ending. Everything began supernaturally. Man be- 
gan supernaturally, and Christ began like everything else. 
Humanity must have come by evolution, or by miracle. To 
come by evolution human life must have been eternally in- 
volved in the earth. It is now almost universally admitted that 
it could not have been involved in the plan of the earth. The 
fiery mist theory precludes this. Science teaches us that this 
earth was once in an incandescent state, some scientists running 
the degrees of heat up into the hundreds of thousands, Fahren- 
heit. We know that no form of life can exist above one- 
quarter of one thousand degrees. Where was human life when 



58 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

the earth was at white heat? Man is here now, and he came 
since the fire. And if so, he did not come by evolution; and 
if not by evolution, then, perforce, by miracle. Any objection, 
therefore, to the divinity of Christ, from the fact of supernat- 
ural origin, proves too much, and that which proves too much 
proves nothing. 

The weightiest objection to the divinity of Jesus Christ is 
found in the mythical theory of Strauss, which briefly stated 
is, that Christ was a good man, but that the ardor, enthusiasm 
and adoration of his followers have gradually developed him 
by attrition into a divine being. When it was first promul- 
gated, it seemed to be a most powerful argument against Chris- 
tianity; but when Christian thought began to assert itself, it 
soon toppled and fell. The great German doubter was com- 
pelled to admit that Christ lived in the time and place claimed 
by his friends; also that he disappeared from this world about 
the year A.D. 34. He was also compelled to admit that there 
were Christian churches in Antioch, Alexandria, Jerusalem, 
Corinth and Eome in the year A.D. 60, founded on the divinity 
of Jesus Christ, the same as we believe it today. Between the 
years A.D. 34 and A.D. 60 is but a little more than a quarter of 
a century, certainly not time for this wonderful growth of 
which he speaks. There were men living in these great centers, 
believers in the divinity of Jesus Christ, who were mature men 
at the time he died. They lived nearer to him than we do to 
President Garfield, and there certainly has not been time enough 
for President Garfield to grow from humanity into an accepted 
divinity. 

In conclusion, I would say that there is a fundamental dif- 
ference between truth and error. The grounds on which truth 
sustains itself remain ever the same, while the grounds which 
sustain error are as shifting as the sands of the sea. I am not 
an old man, but I have lived long enough to see the arguments 
by which infidelity and unfaith propagate themselves changed a 
half dozen times. But the grounds upon which the Christianity 
of the nineteenth century accepts the divinity of Jesus Christ 
are the same as those on which the Christianity of the first 
century accepted him, and every intervening century as well. 



ZACHARY T. SWEENEY 59. 

We thank God for a rock that has stood the shock of time's 
waves, and bids fair to stand forever. 

The sum of this discourse is found in the following state- 
ments: 

1. Reason demands a God. 

2. Reason demands that God be a reality. 

3. Reason demands that God be a being independent in 
Power, Wisdom and Love. 

4. Reason demands that God should speak to us. 

5. Reason demands that Jesus Christ should be acknowl- 
edged as the one through whom God has spoken to us. 

These are the first principles of the gospel. Our gospel is 
not only a revelation from God but its first principles are 
grounded in the nature of things and shall continue till the 
very nature of things shall be no more. 

"Some build their hopes on the ever-drifting sand, 
Some on their fame, their fortunes or their land ; 
Mine on the rock that forever shall stand, 
Jesus, the Kock of Ages." 

PRACTICAL CONCLUSIONS 

1. If we believe in God as having all power. We should never 
never doubt his ability to perform his promises. Many Chris- 
tians spend a great deal of anxiety over God's ability to do 
things because they do not see how it can be done. I am fre- 
quently met with such supposed cases as the following: "Sup- 
pose a man has lost a limb in the Mexican war and has had an 
arm torn off by a corn shredder and what is left of him goes to 
Alaska and is blown to pieces in a dynamite explosion ; how is 
God to get all the parts of that body together again?" Well, 
I am frank to say I do not know, and if I have to stay in my 
grave until some chemist or smart man gets me out, I shall 
never come out. God brought my body from the four quarters 
of the earth once before. He brought meats from the west, fish 
and oysters from the sea and fruits from the south and formed 
my body from these elements; what God did once, he can do 



60 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

again. The believer in God should anchor his faith to the great 
truth that God has all power and that all power is sufficient to 
accomplish all things. 

2. If we believe that God has all wisdom we should never 
doubt his divine superintendence of the world. Many Chris- 
tians believe that God is all-wise so long as everything is going 
on to suit them, but let the regular order of nature be seem- 
ingly broken by too much drouth or flood, too much heat or 
cold, and they are not so sure that God is all-wise; they even 
think they could give him some wise suggestions. All this com- 
plaining at the providence of God arises out of our infidelity as 
to his wisdom. 

3. If we beleive he is all-good, we should never complain be- 
cause of the afflictions and sorrows of life. Death may enter 
your home and lay his cold hand of removal upon your wife; 
you hear the rattle in her throat that tells you his cold fingers 
are feeling for the cords of that precious life. In such an hour 
you should be able to get down upon your knees and pray, 

"Nearer, my God, to Thee, 

Nearer to Thee! 
E'en though it be a cross 

That raiseth me; 
Still all my song shall be, 
Nearer, my God, to Thee, 

Nearer to Thee ! ' ' 

This is faith in the infinite goodness of God. 

4. // we believe that God has revealed his will, we should make 
every effort to understand it and obey it. It should be our 
daily study to conform to all its conditions that we may enjoy 
its promises. Honor, pleasure, riches, the applause of the world 
are trifles when compared to the great blessedness of knowing 
God. 

5. If we believe that his will is made known through Christ, 
he should be Lord of our lives. His teaching should be our 
teaching, his life should be our life, and his spirit should be our 
spirit. We should hear him in all things. Hear him over the 
voices of councils and creeds, over the pronouncements of 



ZACHARY T. SWEENEY 61 

priests and preachers, hear him as the expounder of life's mys- 
teries and duties, and as the conqueror of death and the grave ! 
The constant aspiration of every Christian should be: 

"My faith looks up to Thee, 
Thou Lamb of Calvary, 

Savior Divine. 
Now hear me while I pray, 
Take all my sins away, 
O, let me, from this day, 

Be wholly Thine." 




.-,-•••■ 






HERBERT LOCKWOOD WILLETT 

TTEEBERT LOCKWOOD WILLETT. Born Ionia, Mich., May 5, 1864. 
*■ •*■ Attended Bethany College, Yale University, University of Berlin, 
University of Chicago. A.B. Bethany College, 1886; A.M. ibid., 1887. 
Ph.D. University of Chicago, 1896. Instructor Bible Chair, Ann Arbor, 
Mich., 1893-5. Pastor Dayton, O., 1887-93. Hyde Park Church, Chi- 
cago, 1894-6. Minister Memorial Church of Christ, Chicago, 1908 — . 
Professor of Semitic Languages and Literatures, University of Chicago, 
and Dean of the Disciples Divinity House. Author, "Life and Teachings 
of Jesus, ' > " Prophets of Israel, ' ' ' ' The Ruling Quality, ' ' " Teachings of 
the Books, " " Our Plea for Union and thei Present Crisis, " " Basic Truths 
of the Christian Faith," "The First Book of Samuel," "The Call of the 
Christ," "The Moral Leaders of Israel." "Our Bible." 

The foregoing facts show a busy life for one of Dr. Willett 's age, and 
yet these facts do not indicate anything like the amount of his activity. 
To this list should be added extensive travels, especially in Bible lands, and 
numerous addresses and sermons outside of his regular work, as well as un- 
told labors, which cannot be tabulated. In fact, he has always had entirely 
too much work on hand for him to excel in any one thing; and yet it can- 
not be denied that he has excelled more or less in all the work he has 
undertaken. In scholarship Dr. Willett is the peer of any of his con- 
temporaries. He is a student of books, as well as of men and things, 
keeping abreast of the age in reading the best literature. As an 
educator he has been an eminent success; and as a lecturer on the 
public platform he has few if any equals in that department of 
service. His scholarly attainments, his pleasing personality, and his 
almost marvelous command of an easy and graceful style bring him at 
once into the favor of popular audiences, and consequently his services 
for public platform work have been much in demand. At the same time 
it is probable that he himself would own that his popularity as a lecturer 
has not added to his influence as a preacher of the gospel, though as a 
preacher he has always maintained a strong hold upon the public. But 
preaching is such a distinctive thing in itself, that it is almost jealous of 
any other service that makes demands of the preacher's time and strength. 
The greatest preachers of the world have not dissipated their strength in 
outside matters. 

Among many beautiful characteristics of Dr. Willett I wish to emphasize 
the fact that he is a gentleman, and that means vastly more than that he is 
a genteel man. A man may be a Christian without being a genteel man, 
but he cannot exhibit the graces of the Christian character without being 

63 



64 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

a gentleman. It may be that he will not always agree with one in refer- 
ence to questions of criticism, but one can be sure that Dr. Willett will 
treat him with Christian courtesy. With him the orthodoxy of love and 
conduct is worth more than the orthodoxy of mere words and phrases, and 
especially when these make for divisions among the people of God. We may 
not always agree with him in some of his conclusions, but we should be far 
afield in our appreciation of Christian character if we should fail to recog- 
nize the high-class qualities of the Christian gentleman which Dr. Willett 
possesses. "If any man have not the spirit of Christ he is none of his." 



WHAT DOES GOD DO? 

By H. L. Willett 

Texts. — "Show us the Father, and it sufficeth us." — John 14:8. 
"My soul thirst eth for God, for the living God." — Psalm 
42:2. 

THE words of Philip to Jesus, "Lord, show us the Father," 
express the longing of the heart of man for God. "My soul 
thirsteth for God, for the living God, ' ' was the psalmist 's utter- 
ance of a sentiment common to the race. The conception of an 
infinite Life with, whom we have to do is fundamental in the 
experience of all but small fragments of mankind. All the lit- 
eratures of religion give reverential regard to deity, and it is 
appropriate that the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures, the 
supreme classics of the religious life, should open with the 
words, "In the beginning, God." 

The idea of the Infinite is present in every language. All the 
nations have spoken of the Highest in some manner of speech 
which expressed the regard of the creature for the Creator. 
The ancient Hebrews gave him the names El Shaddai, the 
Protector; Elohim, Deity; and Jahveh, the Life-Giver. The 
Moslem names him Allah, the Hindo calls him Brahm, the 
Parsee speaks of him as Ahura Mazda, and the Indian reveres 
him as the Great Spirit. He has been called by all the hundred 
names written on the tomb of Akbar the Great, and for fear 
they might miss his title, some have anxiously carved upon 
altars reared to him the dedication, "To the Unknown God." 

But though nearly all men have some conception of God, 
address him by some appellation, and assign to him a place 
in the universe, his position and importance in the world- 
order have varied greatly with changing periods and different 
groups. Just as such enterprises as war, discovery, scientific 
research, philosophic discussion, commerce and industry have 

65 



66 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

had varying assessments in different ages, so the idea and im- 
portance of deity have risen and fallen with the generations. 

It cannot be questioned that belief in the Infinite and his 
activities in the world was formerly given a more commanding 
place than is today accorded. Once the idea of God, the su- 
preme arbiter of the affairs of the world, was given first 
rank in the regard of the race. This belief took on all the 
forms of polytheism with which the religions records of man- 
kind are informed. It ranged all the way from the crassest 
fetichism to the most exalted monotheism. But it was alike 
in all its expressions, the effort of the soul of man to find the 
source and fount of life, the ultimate Being with whom all 
have to do. 

Former ages thought of God as the Creator. Either by the 
compelling word of his mouth, or by the direct activity of 
divine craftsmanship, he made the world and all the worlds. 
In obedience to his will, or by the touch of his hand, the 
heavens and the earth took form and stood in their appointed 
places. 

He was the Ruler of nature. Man's place in the order of life 
was very small. It was God who was the worker. He brought 
day and night from their secret habitations and spread them 
over land and sea. He made the seasons to pass in the due 
order of their going. He set the bounds of the great waters and 
measured the heights of the mountains. He trenched out the 
channels of the rivers, and sent the brooks singing on their 
journey to the sea. He planted the forests, called the waving 
grain from the moist earth, and painted the flowers their thou- 
sand colors. He made light and created darkness. He brought 
forth heat and cold from his treasuries. All the events of na- 
ture were the direct activities of his hand. Man's work was as 
nothing compared with this marvel of the divine industry. 

Nor was his task limited to the movements of nature that 
might be called habitual and regular. He was the source from 
which came the distresses that befell mankind. For some 
inscrutable reason he chose at times to bring upon the world 
such afflictions as left no doubt in the mind of primitive man 
that it was the Highest with whom the account must be ad- 



HERBERT LOCKWOOD WILLETT 67 

justed. Sometimes these visitations were believed to be due to 
human sin, and sometimes to the divine purpose to manifest his 
power. In either instance they were not to be questioned. The 
earthquake was his work. Volcanoes poured forth their molten 
depths at his command. The whirlwind ancl the tidal wave 
were the messengers of omnipotence. It was inconceivable to 
the early races that any ruin could be wrought or any plague 
endured save at the pleasure of Deity. ' ' Shall there be evil in 
the city and the Lord have not done it?" asked Amos, and with 
fine resignation Job exclaimed, "The Lord gave and the Lord 
hath taken away ; blessed be the name of the Lord. ' ' 

Plague and blight, draught and mildew, blasting and tempest 
were all the ministers of his will. The pestilence that walked in 
darkness and the destruction that wasted at noonday came in 
response to his call, and in the furtherance of his unchangeable 
purpose. Barrenness, sickness, failing vitality and death were 
all the slaves of his will. 

But these grim visitations were not the only gifts of his hand. 
In that case he would have been a monster indeed. It was not 
in such aspects that the Hebrew was accustomed to think of his 
God. There were nations, to be sure, who looked upon the order 
of nature as the embodiment of cruel caprice and irresponsible 
menace. But to the men of nobler spirit, of whom there were 
many among the Hebrews, God was the great and friendly dis- 
penser of the blessings of life. The Old Testament is full of this 
interpretation of the divine character. Good seasons, warmth 
of sun and refreshing showers, the early and the latter rain, 
the harvest waving in abundance, the cattle on a thousand hills, 
children, friendship, prosperity, beauty, refinements and cour- 
tesies, generous and noble impulse that made gracious the hon- 
ored of their people, inventive skill and constructive genius 
were all his bestowments. 

He it was who dowered Solomon with wisdom, Bezaliel with 
craftsmanship, Jonathan with prowess, and David with a con- 
trite heart. He hardened the soul of Pharaoh, made the spirit 
of Jeremiah like a well of flame against the opposition of his 
people, and tried the heart of Ezekiel with an irreparable loss 
that he might be fitted for his task. The generosity of Abra- 



68 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

ham, the devotion of Ruth, the courage of Joshua, and the elo- 
quence of Isaiah were all of his bestowing. 

So early man thought of God. He was the Master in the 
house of the world, ordering all things according to his will, 
and making evil and good alike obedient to himself. He was 
the giver of truth and all its instruments. Religion was a gift 
of his to the human soul. No man by searching could find out 
God, but he could make himself known to those whom he chose, 
by signs and wonders, by ministries and rites. Through oracle 
and spiritual intuition he released such truth as was needful 
for the hour, and the generations accepted the messages of the 
Infinite as they came from the lips or were wrought by the 
hands of his messengers. Altar and sacrifice, sanctuary and 
priesthood, prophets and sages, law and testimony, Sabbath- 
keeping and pilgrimage, these and all other details of the 
religious life were prescribed for the instruction of his own 
people, ancT through them, of the world. Every act of ritual 
was ordained by him, and their neglect was the way to peril. 

But above all, God was the divine Speaker to the men of the 
past. They conceived of him as uttering himself in many ways. 
Oracles and dreams, visions and apparitions were sent by him 
to make known his will. In one form or another God was be- 
lieved to be evermore talking to mankind. Sometimes it was in 
conversations, as with Moses, and sometimes by dreams, as with 
Jacob; sometimes in visions as with Isaiah, and again in the 
sacred ecstasy, as with Elisha. And since men are ever volu- 
ble, and the teachers of religion come behind none others in 
the gift, it was not difficult to believe that God was speaking 
also, and that the messages of priests and prophets were the 
direct and verbal oracles of God. So the prophets and priests 
themselves believed, and so the people understood. 

Today the feeling of the world is very different on all these 
themes. The small place man occupied in the affairs of the 
universe in earlier generations has grown vastly larger. Cor- 
respondingly the sphere of divine activity has been restricted 
till it nears the point of vanishing. The modern man knows 
that God is not the Creator of the world in any such naive 
and instantaneous fashion as it was once the custom to believe. 



HERBERT LOCKWOOD WILLETT 69 

The studies of the laboratory and the observatory have dis- 
closed something of the immeasurable distance traversed in the 
long and ever-changing progress of the universe to its present 
state. Even yet the process seems far from complete. The 
world is but newborn in the family of the swinging planets. 
All things go on in accordance with seemingly fixed laws. 
Seedtime and harvest, heat and cold, summer and winter, and 
day and night do not cease. Is there a place for God in such 
a universe of law ? Or if men concede that this ceaseless process 
of creation is the work of God, what is his part in it? What 
does God do? 

Nor is God conceived today as the Ruler of the world in any 
manner resembling the primitive tradition. All men have 
given up something of that, and some have given up all. He 
cannot longer be thought of as governing with a strong and 
arbitrary hand. The modern mind does not charge God with 
the responsibility for earthquake, drought and tidal wave. 
Science has been teaching the place and value of even the worst 
of these catastrophes in a universe that is obedient to uniform 
and unvarying law. There are still those about us who find 
comfort in the Hebrew view that such visitations are in accord- 
ance with the divine desire. They prefer to hold this idea 
rather than to confess that all the orderings of nature, good 
and evil, are not his own. But most sensitive minds shrink 
from placing upon God a responsibility that would rob him of 
every quality of sympathy for the suffering world. One 
feels the impropriety, not to say sacrilege, of implicating 
Providence in the deaths and disasters which seem to call for 
frequent public utterance. There is no more effective promoter 
of scepticism than the pious but unintelligent sentiment which 
counsels submission to the hand of God in the time of trouble. 
For even the least reverent of men are quite aware that God 
is not chargeable with the troubles that overtake humanity. 

If this be true, is he then the giver of the blessings for which 
we try to teach our spirits gratitude ? Why should one thank 
God for the gifts of life if he has ceased to be charged with its 
misfortunes? In what sense can it be said that its benefits 
are of his bestowal? In a word, what place is left for him in 



70 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

the modern world with its scientific view of nature and of 
life? What does God do? 

But even more searching is the inquiry as to the place of God 
in the world of religion. It is the commonplace of informed 
reflection upon the best of the ancient faiths that their belief 
in the activity and speech of Deity was rather the expression 
of the ideals of their noblest spirits than the asserted divine 
revelation. There is not a faith of the Orient that does not 
believe itself the inspired message of deity to man. Were these 
ethnic faiths mistaken, or was it really true, as Paul affirmed, 
that God has never left himself without witness among any 
people? Were those innumerable offerings and ceremonies of 
the Hebrew codes really the expression of the will of God, or 
were they the devices of the priesthood ? And what bearing on 
the inquiry has the familiar fact that every one of them was 
taken in some manner, by inheritance or imitation, from older 
or neighboring peoples? What did God really do in those 
years when the law and the ritual and the religion of Israel 
were taking form ? We have left the place where we can longer 
affirm that this complex of ceremony, limited views of morality, 
and conflicting words regarding the deepest questions of reli- 
gion, was the revelation of God to Israel. We know its value 
in the religious education of a race, but we cannot charge the 
God whom Jesus worshiped with its faults and limitations. 

Has religion through all the centuries been more than the 
aspiration of the human soul after a nobler life? Is it any- 
thing more than social sentiment touched with something of 
the mystery of the unknown? Has not humanity devised the 
instruments and accessories of worship, even as it has coined 
its forms of language? And when one says that God has 
spoken in the past, has it not after all been the voice of 
humanity speaking constantly, and often thinking that God 
was uttering his will? Above all, if God has spoken in the 
past, why does he not speak today? Was there any reason 
why he should have held speech with man once, and then 
ceased to do so ? Or did he utter his complete mind, and then 
relapse into unbroken silence? No man is convinced by such 
arguments. What did God ever do that he is not doing today ? 



HERBERT LOCKWOOD WILLETT 71 

Here is the crux of the whole insistent demand for light. 
What does God do in the modern universe ? Is there any place 
for his activity longer? It is useless to deny that all men 
have given over something of the primitive conception of a 
ceaselessly active God, intent upon the mechanical tasks of 
the world. And it is equally true that some men have given 
over all that earlier generations held concerning the divine 
activity. In the world of the past there was little room for 
man. Today it would seem that there is little room for God. 
One is reminded of the idol-makers of Babylon described in 
the mordant phrases of the Isaiah of the Exile. They took a 
tree, and of part of it they made their beds and tables, stools 
and lampstands. Another part they took to kindle the fire 
on which they cooked their food. And of the rest of that same 
tree they made a god. How little must have been left to 
carve into Deity! Has not the modern world gradually 
stripped God of his place and function until it has left only 
enough material to make an inconsequential God, whom it is 
hardly worth while to worship? 

One who looks at modern life with discerning eye finds few 
evidences, that the Infinite has place or value. Is there any 
need of him in the field of political activity? What statesmen 
of today shape their policies ' ' as in the great Taskmaster 's 
eye?" Is the business of the present generation conducted 
on the principle that there is a divine, if silent, partner in 
the concern? In the world of pleasure who takes time to 
think of the deeper sanctions and more serious purposes of 
life? Is the journalism of our age sensitive to the mighty 
pulses of the kingdom of God? Does industry stand for one 
moment in silence in the presence of the great Worker of the 
past? Even in the family group as it takes form in our time, 
is there any place for God? 

It is still regarded as necessary that a moderate space should 
be kept for him in the churches, though it is often reduced to 
the measure of the Sundays. But even so, there must be many 
who wonder what he does with his time through the long 
week. Then there is a little place reserved for him in the 
volumes of religious literature; but few people trouble them- 



72 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

selves about such books today. The groups of men and women 
who devote themselves professionally to religious work are 
supposed to know about God, and to have time for converse 
with him. But the average person regards that kind of life 
as unearthly and remote from vital human interests. Mean- 
time what does God do? Is it worth while to believe in a 
Being who occupies so inconspicuous a place in the regard 
of our generation? 

One turns from this negative, but too largely actual, state 
of the case to contemplate the real and assured place of God 
in the universe. Perhaps the denial or neglect of the Divine 
is due in no small degree to the confident assumptions of earlier 
ages regarding him. Men grow sceptical where there is such 
insistent affirmation. The twentieth century is becoming very 
weary of the dogmatism of the fourth. The scholastic circles 
of a former time were able to define and describe and vindicate 
the Deity to the last degree of accuracy. They talked of him 
with the assured and patronizing air which no modern scientist 
would assume in the discussion of a rock or a beetle. From 
such presumptuous claims to knowledge the present age has 
swung far in its protest against infallibility. It has discovered 
that there were few funds in the bank of knowledge to meet 
the drafts so lightly drawn by the men of the past. 

And yet no inquiring spirit can be satisfied with negatives 
and denials. The rich experience of the ages has proved the 
reality of God, even as the prophets and Jesus affirmed. His 
place in the universe can never be that small and remote circle 
to which too many in the subjective world of their own souls 
have reduced him. To the eager and searching spirit he is real 
and present. And this after all is the supreme concern of man- 
kind. A universe without him is as the blackness of darkness. 
It is easy to think that one is an unbeliever in Deity, merely 
because he has ceased to have faith in the sort of God some- 
one else has described. But to settle oneself calmly to the 
thought of a godless world is a more serious proceeding. Peo- 
ple imagine themselves the victims of many sorts of misfor- 
tune, and there are distresses that are very real. It is not 
difficult to make a catalogue of trouble, calamity, suffering and 



HERBERT LOCKWOOD WILLETT 73 

disappointment. But the only anguish that has no cure is the 
sense of loss that comes from a denial that there is a God. This 
is the bitter pain that never ceases. There are sufferings that 
come from hunger, from poverty, from bereavement. But the 
soul of suffering is the thought that perhaps there is no great 
Companion. The sorrow of a life orphaned of the Father is the 
supreme tragedy. 

In no such forlorn universe does the man of insight live. 
He is aware that he cannot boast of large knowledge of Deity, 
as earlier and bolder generations did. But somewhat he 
knows; and that somewhat is sufficient to serve him in the ad- 
venture of life. He is more modest in his affirmations than 
some who have gone before him, but this modesty is the proper 
reticence of partial and unfolding knowledge. He cannot gain 
his own consent to attempt the definition of the Infinite in 
lengthened categories, but he is confident that he can make the 
language of Frederic Myers his own: 

"Whoso hath felt the spirit of the Highest 
Cannot confound nor doubt him nor deny : 
Yea with one voice, O world, though thou deniest, 
Stand thou on that side, for on this am I. " 

He is the Creator and Ruler of the universe. If science has 
discredited the older beliefs as to the direct and mechanical 
manner in which the divine activity is manifested in material 
nature, not less has it vindicated the right of the devout soul 
to perceive in all the processes of physical life the unvarying 
guidance of the laws which are only God's ways of working. 
If the universe is vastly older and larger than the writers of 
the Bible understood, it is by so much the greater theater for 
the divine industry. The Psalmist thought with reverence of 
a God who set his glory upon the heavens, as a painter puts his 
own conceptions upon the canvas. But science has revealed 
vast extensions of the canvas of creative effort, and by so 
much has lifted to higher levels the conception of the Creator. 
And furthermore, it is apparent that this vast labor goes 
onward ceaselessly through the ages. Never has the divine energy 
been unemployed in the vast enterprises of the changing 



74 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

worlds. To the Jews who worried themselves about the break- 
ing of the Sabbath rest, Jesus said ''My father has always 
worked, and I work." And that unceasing movement of the 
physical organism toward some as-yet-unknown goal, that 
evolution of forms which is yet to traverse unbelievable diam- 
eters of space and time is all a part of the Father's work. As 
yet the universe is very young. The earth, with its millions of 
years gone by, is yet in its morning-time. And humanity, the 
latest arriving of its forms of life, is only in its infancy as yet. 
The writer of Genesis declared that God made man in his own 
image. Even more truly may it be said that God is making 
man in his image as rapidly as we give him the right of way. 
Never has there been a moment since the dim, far-off, myste- 
rious beginnings in which God was not at work, realizing him- 
self in the plastic materials of nature and humanity. 

He is the Euler of the worlds. By unfailing laws which 
operate to the ends of righteousness he is governing the na- 
tions, and making even the wrath of man to praise him. The 
blessings and penalties of life are, in a truer sense than the 
Hebrews ever understood, the results of his unfailing govern- 
ment. The universe is keyed only to beneficent ends. The 
rejection of the divine program, as made increasingly clear by 
centuries of teaching and experiment, is the open way to dis- 
aster. Conformity to the purpose of God, as it is interpreted 
by the spiritual leaders of the race, and especially by Jesus, is 
the secret of success. Men throw themselves against the on- 
ward-moving enterprises of God at their peril. Not less surely, 
by co-operation with the divine purpose does man master the 
secret of power. The world gives up its reserves of wealth in 
material and immaterial forms to those who pay the price of 
research after its mysteries. Power comes through knowledge. 
The diseases that swept away multitudes of victims in earlier 
ages are now held at bay or are vanishing. The disasters, fire, 
flood, earthquake and storm, are now brought under some meas- 
ure of control by skill and foresight. These are human achieve- 
ments, but not human alone. Nature waits to reveal her secrets 
to the sons of God, and every discovery of the laboratory or the 
study is a further co-operation with the self-revealing purpose 



HEEBERT LOCKWOOD WILLETT 75 

of God. And if the physical universe is yielding up its inti- 
macies, not less does man by the blessing of the Father learn to 
master wider areas of the moral life. Some lessons are learned 
and forever learned in the school of experience, which is the 
school of God. Some of these lessons are terribly costly, but 
once learned they are not easily forgotten, and "through the 
measure of the years we sweep into the broader day." 

In a very real sense God is the giver of religion. If we have 
learned that the sacred books of all the ages, those of the 
Hebrew and the Christian classics not less than others, were 
written not by heaven-controlled men but, as they themselves 
affirm, by "holy men of old who were moved, urged on, im- 
pelled, by the Spirit of God, ' ' we are the more free to discover 
in them the passionate search of the soul after God, and the 
unfailing answer to that search. If the laws and rites of an 
earlier age were not in very fact prescribed by divine enact- 
ment, but were developed out of the inheritance of the past, 
the customs of contemporary peoples and the exigencies of 
prophetic and priestly leadership, we are the more sensitive to 
the wisdom by which they were adapted to the adolescent needs 
of a race. And if the doctrines formulated in the name of Chris- 
tianity seem often to miss by wide spaces the thought of Jesus 
and his first interpreters, we may perceive that they have not 
been without value at certain periods in the history of the 
church, and at base express some truth that has been worthful 
in the development of character. In all this the hand of God 
may be seen. If he has been less particular about ordinances 
and organizations than his people have sometimes supposed, it 
is that there are more important things in his program. If he 
has been less voluble than the prattling generations have tried 
to represent him, it is rather that he might utter himself where 
alone he can be understood, — in human life. The Word must 
become flesh before it can become intelligible. 

God is the Friend, the Companion of the soul. Jesus de- 
lighted to call him Father. And in so doing he took all that 
the ages had said of him and raised it to the highest power. 
And our generation is learning afresh the fact that these terms 
denote personality, in spite of all the difficulties that seem to 



76 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

hedge that term about. Does it seem a limitation of Deity to 
call it personal? It may be that our definitions are too 
small. We do not yet know much even of human personality. 
We have to walk softly where former centuries hurried on 
with confidence. Much has to be left unsaid. But of one thing 
we may be sure : Jesus knew more of God than any other who 
has passed this way. And to him he was Father, personal and 
precious. In the deep joy of personal communion with the 
Father he passed his days. And his experience is classic for 
the race. More than personal God may be, and the centuries 
must give larger knowledge and new vocabularies for its ex- 
pression. But less than personal he cannot be to any who are 
minded to give to Jesus the final word. 

God is the beloved of the soul. The prophets so rejoiced in 
him, the saints have so found him, and the holy church through- 
out all the world bears witness to the fact, That timeless and 
blessed relation of sonship which Jesus first experienced has 
become the haunting dream of the noblest spirits of the ages. 
And not in vain has been the quest. Into that intimacy there is 
open way for any who are smitten by the great desire. The 
discovery of the secret is hidden only from those who will 
not see. 

God is eternal, and in his life the meaning of eternity be- 
comes clear. The soul pants for him as the hart for the water- 
brooks. The eager spirit pursues hard after him, for he is the 
sum and the totality of life. Whatever good is done in all the 
world, and by any hand, is of his doing. Whatever knowledge 
is gained in any corner of the universe is of his bestowing. 
And whatever holiness in character is won, it is a gift from 
him. In him we are complete, and in the completion of our 
lives in power and purity he finds his own eternal joy. In 
such a universe, moving on to gracious ends in righteousness, 
and luminous to the eye of faith with the presence of the divine, 
there is no longer room for the doubting question, "What 
does God do?" 



JAMES HARVEY GARRISON 

n^HE subject of this sketch belongs to the older men of the last fifty 
■*■ years, some of whom had to be included in this volume in order to 
connect with the pulpit of a half century ago. But on many other 
accounts he is entitled to a place in any volume intended to represent the 
best ideals of the Disciples for the period which supplements the pulpit of 
the Old period. It is true that Dr. Garrison has not for several years been 
prominent in pulpit work, but it is equally true that in many of the years 
that are past, he has been recognized as one of the ablest preachers among 
the Disciples, and is still the peer of any in the quality of his work in the 
art of sermon building, as his sermon in this volume amply testifies. 

J. H. Garrison was born Feb. 2, 1842, near Ozark, in Christian County, 
Mo. Lived on the farm, plowing and sowing and reaping and mowing, and 
hoeing, attending village school in winter, until he was eighteen. Taught 
a country school at 16 years of age and had one year in an academy in 
Ozark. Four years in the Union Army from 19 to 23 years of age. En- 
listed as private, promoted to sergeant in a few months, wounded in the 
battle of Pea Ridge, and was promoted to rank of captain of the 8th Mis- 
souri Cavalry Volunteers at the age of twenty. Held this position till close 
of war, though commissioned as major by the governor near its close. 
Entered Abingdon College in 1865. Took the four years' course in three 
years and graduated in 1868. One week after graduation he married Judith 
Elizabeth Garrett, who graduated in the same class with him. At college 
he identified himself with the Disciples having been a member of the 
Baptist church since early boyhood. 

In 1869 he began his editorial career with J. C. Reynolds, on "The 
Gospel Echo" — afterwards "The Christian" — which he began publishing 
in St. Louis in 1874. At the same time he formed the Christian Publish- 
ing Company. Later the name of the paper was changed from ' ' The Chris- 
tian" to "The Christian-Evangelist." In 1881 he went to Southport, Eng- 
land, under the Foreign Christian Missionary Society, remaining for more 
than a year. In 1884 he went to Boston, Mass., under the American Chris- 
tian Missionary Society, remaining two years, but during all his absence 
he continued editor of the paper, even though preaching all the time. It 
was as editor of "The Christian-Evangelist" that Dr. Garrison did his 
great life-work. No one can measure the height, depth and breadth of the 
influence for righteousness that this consecrated weekly visitor brought to 
homes and hearts in our fair land. Dr. Garrison's service to the cause of 
Christ, through his paper, has been particularly distinguished. There was 

77 



78 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

universal regret when in 1912, at the age of 70 years, he resigned the active 
editorship of ' ' The Christian-Evangelist, ' ' although he has since been 
editor emeritus and contributes weekly articles. In 1916 he removed his 
home from St. Louis, Mo., to Claremont, Cal., having previously spent much 
time in that fair state. These are the facts of a full life, although he does 
not so term it, but says, ' ' I have done very little but it has kept me mighty 
busy. ' ' 

Dr. Garrison's personal characteristics are well known. His private life 
is an open book. No man among the Disciples has more profoundly im- 
pressed his Christian life upon the Churches. Both with tongue and pen 
he has earnestly pled for high ideals in Christian living, and he has em- 
phasized this pleading by illustrating the ideals in his own godly life. Not 
that he is without fault. He is human like the rest of us. But when we 
consider the temptations which beset an active public life such as his, it 
must be conceded that he has come through it all with a character strength- 
ened rather than weakened, leaving a splendid testimony to the power of a 
worthy Christian life. 

Intellectually Dr. Garrison is not a sky rocket, but a steady burning light. 
He is intuitional, but never loses sight of the outward conditions of life. 
He is a dreamer, but his dreams all come to him in daylight while he is 
profoundly awake, and he never forgets that he is still in the body, no 
matter how beautiful the ideals of spiritual life may appear. 

As a preacher he is solid rather than brilliant ; strong rather than big ; 
safe rather than novel. He is not an icicle, neither is he a boiling cauldron. 

As regards his work in general, he is a liberal conservative. He believes 
in progress, but does not believe in tearing up the platform on which prog- 
ress makes its steps. 

As a writer he works in the middle of the road, but he keeps moving 
on the road. He never stands tomorrow just where he is today. With him 
life is a moving panorama where each step reveals something new, but which 
is always somewhat related to the old. 




£W?. 




THE LIGHT OF LIFE; OR, GOD'S 
METHOD OF REVELATION 

By J. H. Garrison 

Text. — "In Him was Life and the Life ivas the Light of Men." 
John 1:4. 

THE great key- words of John 's gospel are, Life, Light, Trnth, 
and Love. These words stand for ultimate realities so vast, 
so vital, that without them the universe would be chaos instead 
of kosmos. Two of these great words occur in our text — Life, 
and Light. The meaning of these terms is too large for defini- 
tion in a strict sense, and the best we can do is to describe 
something of their nature and function. 

A distinguished scientist has defined life as harmony with 
environment. That is, a tree or plant, or flower, lives because 
of its union and harmonious relation with the soil, the sunshine, 
the air, and water. If you break up this union or harmony of 
the tree or plant with its environment death ensues. The same 
is true of animal life. If we ascend into the- higher ranges of 
man's nature, we shall find that this principle holds good with 
respect to the life of the spirit. Man's environment, according 
to Paul, is God. "In him we live, and move, and have our 
being." It is only through the soul's union with God that the 
spiritual life is begotten and maintained. 

There are degrees of life and health, both in the physical and 
spiritual realms, according to the perfection of the unity 
between the living being, or thing, and its life-source. There 
are feeble, sickly folk in the spiritual, as well as in the physical 
realm, because of a lack of harmony with their spiritual en- 
vironment. The condition of fullness of life is a perfect union 
with God, our spiritual environment ; or, in the fine phrase of 
Ralph Waldo Trine, it is to be "in tune with the Infinite." Of 
all modern inventions, wireless telegraphy has seemed to me 

79 t-^ 



80 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

the most wonderful and suggestive. By means of a certain elec- 
trical device a message is thrown out into space and is carried 
for hundreds of miles, and is caught up by another instrument, 
pitched in the same key. It is this fact of the harmony of 
the receiving instrument with the one sending it, that enables 
it to receive the message. It is only as our souls are attuned to 
the Infinite that we can receive God's messages to us. 

But to return to our definitions. The most comprehensive 
description of light, and the one which best suits our purpose, is 
that of Paul: " Whatsoever maketh manifest is light." It is 
the supreme office of light to make clear, or manifest, that 
which hitherto was hidden in darkness. What a magnificent 
office the sun performs for our earth and the solar system, in 
revealing to us the character, the beauty, and the value of the 
planet which is our temporary abiding place ! 

Now putting the meaning of these two great words together, 
the text affirms that God's method of revelation, that is of 
making spiritual truth manifest to the world, is through life — 
his perfect revelation being made in his Son. "In Him was 
life, and the life was the light of man." If the order of these 
words had been reversed, and the text had read, "In Him was 
light, and the light was the life of men," I should have preached 
from the text many years before I did. In that form it would 
have stated a more obvious, but a far less profound truth, than 
is stated in the text as it reads. Life is God's method of revela- 
tion in nature also. Who would have guessed that an oak was 
concealed in an acorn before life manifested this secret to the 
world? Who would have prophesied that the dry, uncomely 
bulb contains the lily, until the miracle of life had disclosed 
the fact? How difficult it would be to describe a rose to a 
person who had never seen one ! 

Words at best are imperfect vehicles of thought. All of us 
have felt the surge of great ideas stirring our hearts which we 
have found it impossible to adequately express in human 
speech. May we not say it reverently, that even God himself 
found our human language an inadequate vehicle for convey- 
ing some of the great thoughts which he wished to express to 
mankind? This is one reason at least why, "The word was 



JAMES HARVEY GARRISON 81 

made flesh and dwelt among us. ' ' The author of the Hebrew 
letter expresses this same thought in the beginning of his elo- 
quent treatise: "God, having of old time spoken unto the 
fathers in the prophets by divers portions and in divers man- 
ners, hath at the end of these days spoken unto us in his Son. ' ' 
(Hebrews 1:2.) Partial communications of truth could be made 
through "holy men of old," but the perfect revelation of God's 
character and will must wait the coming of One who was ' ' The 
effulgence of his glory, and the very image of his substance." 
(Hebrews 1:3.) 

It is proper now to ask, what are some of the great truths 
which" God chose to make manifest to the world in the life of 
his Son? 

I. The fatherhood of God. It was a matter of infinite moment 
that God's true character should be made known to men. God's 
heart, we may be sure, was yearning to make this revelation, 
while the human heart was in deep and anxious quest of knowl- 
edge about the true God. That there was an infinite power 
behind all material phenonema was evident ; but what was the 
attitude of this infinite power to man? Was it a hostile and 
angry power that had to be appeased, as the heathen sup- 
posed? The prophets of the olden time had told of a God, 
who was holy and just, and tender, and compassionate, but it 
remained for Jesus to manifest to the world God's true father- 
hood by living what he taught. ' ' No man knoweth the Father 
but the Son, and he to whom the Son shall reveal Him." (Matt. 
11:27.) Philip uttered one of the deepest needs of the human 
heart when he said to the Master, "Lord, show us the Father 
and it sufficeth us." (John 14:8.) It was as if he had said, 
"We have been told about the Creator, the great Jehovah, the 
mighty Sovereign, but our hearts are longing to know some- 
thing about the Father. You have mentioned that name to 
us several times, but we want to know what kind of a being he 
is. We want to see him. Show us the Father, and that will 
satisfy us." Are we not all thankful to Philip for thus truly 
interpreting the deepest desire of the human heart? The re- 
ply of Jesus is full of significance: "Have I been so long time 



82 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

with you, and dost thou not know me, Philip? He that hath 
seen me, hath seen the Father; how say est thou show us the 
Father?" During all his life Jesus had been showing the 
Father to man by his own life — by what he was, and what he 
did. When he opened the eyes of the blind he was showing 
what pity God feels for that unfortunate class. When he fed 
the hungry multitudes, he was showing that God cares for the 
hunger and weariness of the common people. When he healed 
the sick, when he raised the dead, when he comforted the sor- 
rowing, and especially when he laid down his life for the sins 
of men, he was showing the tender, compassionate, father-heart 
of God. It would be impossible to exaggerate the value of this 
great truth that lies at the foundation of all our hope, of all 
our missionary operations, and of all benevolent activities for 
the relief of human suffering and bettering the condition of 
men. It was because Jesus perfectly incarnated the life of 
God that he could say, ''The Father and I are one. He that 
hath seen me hath seen the Father." 

II. His own divine Sonship and Saviorhood. In revealing 
God as Father, Jesus necessarily revealed himself as God's 
Son. It was this unique relationship to God as his only-begot- 
ten Son that enabled him to make manifest the true character 
of his Father. Only a perfect Son could show to men a per- 
fect Father. It was not enough that God should reveal himself 
as Father. He must also reveal his Saviorhood. How does 
God show his Fatherhood? By sending his well-beloved Son 
into the world that the world through him might be saved. 
"God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son 
that whosoever believeth on him might not perish but have 
everlasting life." (John 3:16.) If it required a perfect Son 
to reveal a perfect Father, it also required a perfect Father to 
send so perfect a Savior into the world. Jesus demonstrated 
his divine Sonship, by his sinless life, by his mighty deeds, 
by his supreme devotion to his Father's business. He mani- 
fested his power to save by his miracles of healing, by his 
power to awaken the sense of guilt, and by granting forgive- 
ness to sin-burdened souls. The crowning proof of his will- 
ingness and power to save was his death on the cross for the 



JAMES HARVEY GARRISON 83 

sins of the world and his resurrection from the dead. In his 
sacrificial life and death he was making manifest the fact that 
God had made provision in him for the world's redemption. 
Even before his crucifixion and resurrection, his disciples who 
stood nearest to him were constrained to say to him, "Thou 
art the Christ, the Son of the living God" — a truth confirmed 
by later events, and one for which they laid down their own 
lives. In his life they saw manifested his Messiahship, his 
Sonship. "In him was life, and the life was the light of 
men. ' ' 

III. The value of the human soul and the possibilities of our 
human nature. It was not until God was manifested in the 
flesh, not until Jesus of Nazareth, born in poverty and obscurity, 
had lived a true and victorious life, resisting all forms of sin 
and temptation, dying upon the cross, and triumphing over 
death, and rising to heights of supreme power and influence on 
the life of the world, that men came to realize the essential 
dignity of human nature and its mighty possibilities when 
brought into union with God. Since then men have begun to 
understand the sublimity of life here in the flesh, as a means 
of discipline and education for the eternities beyond. And out 
of this conception of man's rightful place and destiny, de- 
mocracy has been born, and human rights have been asserted 
in the overthrow of tyrannies, in writing laws and constitu- 
tions which have recognized human rights, and in the building 
up of governments that are ' ' of the people, by the people, and 
for the people." The kingship of every man is a truth made 
manifest in the life of Jesus. 

IV. How man, alienated from God by sin, may be brought 
into union with God. This was a truth the world needed to 
know. In the life of Jesus, and especially in his death, the 
world was not only made conscious of the awful nature of sin 
and its consequences, but was made to see also in Christ, and 
in his atoning death, a remedy for sin and the means of be- 
coming united with God. Never did the world know the ex- 
ceeding sinfulness of sin until it nailed Christ to the cross. 
Never did the world know the height and depth and breadth 



84 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

of the love of God for mankind until he gave his only begotten 
Son to die, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to 
himself. Here was a truth that mere words could not convey 
to men. It took the sacrificial life and death of the sinless Son 
of God, and Son of Man, to bring this truth home to the hearts 
of men. The chief of the apostles writing to the Galatians 
exclaimed : ' ' God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross 
of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world was crucified unto 
me and I unto the world." To the Corinthians he said, "For 
I determined to know nothing among you save Jesus Christ and 
him crucified." Jesus himself attached great value to his 
sacrificial death. When told that some Greeks wished to see 
him, he said, "And I, when I am lifted up, will draw all men 
unto me. ' ' It will be a sad day for the Church if it shall ever 
permit any science or philosophy, falsely so-called, to wean it 
from this fundamental fact and doctrine of the cross, in which 
the life of Christ, sealed by his sacrificial death, became the 
light of men. 

"Right forever on the scaffold, 
Wrong forever on the throne. 
Yet that scaffold sways the future, 
For behind the dim unknown 
Standeth God within the shadow 
Keeping watch above his own. ' ' 

V. Finally, life and immortality were brought to light in the 
life and death, and resurrection from the dead, of Jesus Christ, 
our Lord. The problem of life hereafter was one that had baf- 
fled all the generations of men before the coming of Christ. 
The question of Job, "If a man die, shall he live again?" re- 
mained unanswered through all the anxious and waiting cen- 
turies, until Christ came, and having conquered sin, also con- 
quered death, and brought life and immortality to light. He 
lived the life eternal while he was here among men. He told 
his disciples plainly, "He that liveth and believeth on me shall 
never die." "Because I live ye shall live also." "In my 
Father's house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would 
have told you. ' ' No, he never held out any false hopes to men. 



JAMES HARVEY GARRISON 85 

He was the personification of candor and veracity. If there 
had been no Father's house with its many apartments, to re- 
ceive his followers when this mortal life is ended, he would 
have told them. On that rock of Christ's word alone I would 
be willing to base my hope of the "home over there." But he 
did not stop with words, however plain and comforting in 
their content. He actually died and was buried, and rose 
again from the dead, and appeared repeatedly to his disciples 
afterwards, that he might place beyond all doubt the fact of 
his resurrection and the reality of the life hereafter. But after 
all it was the life that made the resurrection possible and 
credible. 

These were wonderful achievements. How did Jesus ac- 
complish them? He wrote no books, but the world is full of 
literature concerning him. He composed no music, and yet the 
sweetest songs of earth are sung in honor of him. He painted 
no pictures, but the greatest masterpieces of the world are 
those which have been inspired by his life and character. He 
had no throne but the cross on which he was crucified, while 
yet a young man; and yet he wields a scepter more powerful 
today than all the kings and emperors of earth, and "of the 
increase of his government there shall be no end. ' ' What was 
the secret of his power? He lived a life of such wonderful 
beauty and perfection, of such marvelous love and self-sacrifice, 
and sealed it all with a death so sacrificial, and a resurrection so 
victorious, as to have revealed God, and man, and human duty, 
and human destiny. 

"In Him was life, and the life was the light of man. }> 
The practical lesson for us today, to be deduced from these 
facts and truths remains to be stated. God has not changed 
his method of revelation. He still uses consecrated personality 
as the chief instrument of conveying truth. In great crises of 
the Church he has raised up "men of light and leading," and 
in them and through them has spoken to men his message for 
the time. Such men were Luther, Calvin, Knox, Wesley, the 
Campbells, and many another man less conspicuous, whose 



86 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

lives, permeated with the life of God, have been used to make 
manifest certain truths for their time. 

But not to isolated individuals in the Church has been left 
the responsibility of perpetuating in the world the light of 
Christ's life, but to the Church itself, which is "the pillar 
and support of the truth.'' As Jesus Christ was the incarna- 
tion of God, so the Church is the incarnation of Christ, which 
is his body, indwelt by the Holy Spirit. The Church can be 
effective in doing Christ's work only as it manifests his spirit 
and is loyal to his example and teaching. How far is the 
Church of our day fulfilling these conditions, which we all 
recognize as essential to its highest efficiency? 

God forbid that I should be an accuser of my brethren in the 
Church of our time ! I am always ready to defend it against 
false accusations. It is a better Church by far than it was in 
previous ages. In my own time it has made great improve- 
ment, in its fraternal spirit, in its doctrine, in its co-operative 
life in spreading the gospel. And yet when we compare what 
it is today, — a group of distinct denominations with different 
names, creeds, practices and polities, each striving primarily 
to advance its own interests, and often failing to recognize 
others as having part with itself in the rights and privileges of 
the Kingdom — with the mind of Christ, and with the ideal set 
forth in the New Testament, and especially with the prayer of 
our Lord for the unity of his disciples to the end that the world 
might believe that the Father had sent him (John 17:20,21), 
who of us can feel that the Church of today is worthily rep- 
resenting Christ ? In these wonderful times of peril and oppor- 
tunity, is it not doubly sinful to waste our strength in building 
up party walls on party foundations when our Lord is calling 
us to united action in behalf of his Kingdom ? Are we not mis- 
representing Christ by our divisions and unfraternal spirit? 

Once more: When we think of our Lord's sacrificial life, 
how he gave himself without thought of ease, or worldly pos- 
sessions, or honor, to the alleviation of human suffering, and 
to advancing the Kingdom of Heaven, not having where to 
lay his head, persecuted, falsely accused, betrayed, crucified, 



JAMES HARVEY GARRISON 87 

and dying with a prayer on his lips for his enemies — when we 
think of all that, do we not find it difficult to persuade ourselves 
that we are Christians, in our easy-going way of living, giving 
large time to our own business and very little to the Lord's 
business; making investments for the sake of profits for our- 
selves, but making little or no sacrifices for the work of the 
Lord? The whole Church needs to be awakened to a sense of 
its obligation to give more time, more personal work, more 
money, for the conversion of the world. In other words the 
Church needs to live its doctrine as Jesus did. Until the 
Church incarnates more perfectly Christ's life, its life cannot 
be "the light of men," and it will fail to that extent in fulfill- 
ing its divine mission. 

Jesus Christ is calling his Church today into a more vital 
union with himself, and to a closer union among its divided 
ranks, in order to meet the extraordinary demands of our day. 
What manner of people ought they to be in holiness of life, in 
wholeness of service, and in all tenderness of persuasion, who 
are seeking to voice this message of our Christ to the Church 
of our day ? Ought they not, must they not incarnate this mes- 
sage of unity, and of consecration to the work of Christ, among 
themselves, in order that this divine message may have the 
"light of life" to guide the men of our generation? Jesus 
Christ wants to live in his Church, and through it as his own 
chosen agency, to continue making his life the light of men, 
until the consummation of his great and gracious purposes in 
the world. He cannot do that effectively through a divided 
and half-consecrated Church. It is only a partial, a divided 
Christ, that the world sees in the life of the Church today. 
"When his prayer for the unity of his disciples shall be an- 
swered, and they shall be one with him and the Father, and one 
among themselves, then it can be said of the Church, as it was 
said of her Founder, "In it was life, and the life was the light 
of men, ' ' for through it the light of his life shall shine on all the 
nations, and peoples, and tribes of earth, and all the kingdoms 
of the world shall become the Kingdom of our God, and his 
will shall be done on earth even as it is done in heaven ! 



EDWARD LINDSAY POWELL 

THE subject of this sketch occupies a unique position among the Dis- 
ciples. He is the last prominent representative of the Old School 
of Oratory which was fashionable in the days of Henry Clay, and even 
Henry Clay, if living, would not be ashamed of Dr. Powell's style. Of 
course, there is no stereotyped style of oration. Bishop Whately defines 
the true orator as the man who by honorable means can carry his point, 
and according to this, Dr. Powell is a true orator. Indeed, it is doubtful 
if there is another preacher among the Disciples who is capable of wield- 
ing more immediate influence in a single discourse. 

Dr. Powell was born in King William County, Va., May 8, 1860, and 
is therefore just now in the period of his mature and strongest intellectual 
manhood. He received the B.L. degree from Christian University, at Can- 
ton, Mo., in 1881, and later the LL.D. from Transylvania University and 
the University of Kentucky. But while his academic scholarship is good, 
he is really what is styled a self-made man, and this fact is, perhaps, the 
parent of that independent character which has given him his unique posi- 
tion among the preachers of his day. 

He does his own thinking, and while he is courteous and kind to those 
who differ with him, his very nature rebels against the dogmatism of 
ignorance and the despotism of intolerance. 

He has been married twice; first, to Miss Lida Smoot, of Maysville, Ky., 
May 11, 1887, who died Feb. 16, 1907. He was again married in 1909 to 
Dr. Anna M. D. Gordon, of Mungeli, C. P. India. 

He has held pastorates at Lynchburg, Va., Charlottesville, Va., Gordons- 
ville, Va., Norfolk, Va., and at Hopkinsville, Ky., and Maysville, Ky. But 
his most distinguished pastorate is the one he now holds, at First Christian 
Church, Louisville, Ky., where he has been located since 1887. 

His ministry at Louisville is another evidence of the power of a long 
pastorate. While his services are sought in many directions, he seldom 
leaves his local work for even the most inviting call of a general char- 
acter. Of course he has had numerous calls to other inviting fields, 
but he has persistently turned all these down, and has now served about 
thirty years at one church. What that church is today, he, by divine favor, 
has made it, and what he is today, that church, with God's blessing, has 
made him. It is this mutual helpfulness which is so desirable, and which 
comes about only in a long pastorate. 

Another element in Dr. Powell's success is his giving the pulpit the 
first place in all his life work. He has not spoiled his sermons by denuding 

89 



90 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

them of strength in order to enable him to play hide and seek with litera- 
ture. He has published only two books, neither of which is very pre- 
tentious, but both of which are within his pulpit ministrations, "Sav- 
onarola, or the Eeformation of a City, " and a volume of sermons entitled 
' ' The Victory of Faith. ' ' 




Ycurs sincerely. 



THE OLD GOSPEL FOR THE NEW 

AGE 

By E. L. Powell 

Text. — "In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sit- 
ting upon a throne high and lifted up, and His throne filled 
the Temple." — Isaiah 6:1. 

THERE are those who belong to the spiritual elect, to the real 
aristocracy of God, who are demanding, with pleas and 
prayers and petitions, that the church and the pulpit shall give to 
them once again the old gospel. I recognize the meaning of 
this prayerful and pleading request. By it is meant: Give us 
the old gospel of soft lights and moonlit gardens; the gospel 
of tenderness and sweetness ; the gospel that lulls and soothes 
and quiets. We are tired of the noises and voices; we are 
tired of the din of traffic; we are tired of turbulence in the 
religious realm ; we wish for some intimations and suggestions 
in the message proclaimed which will speak peace to our souls. 

This is what the saints mean — especially the gospel of sweet 
memories, the gospel associated with the losses and sorrows 
and sins of life in its comforting and healing and beneficent 
influence. 

I verily believe that that gospel is being preached today, that 
the old gospel in this age whispers comfort to the weary, 
speaks with radiancy of countenance forgiveness to the peni- 
tent sinner, and bends over the dying bed to point the soul 
passing out into eternity to the land that is fairer than day. 
There are those again who when they ask us to give them the 
old gospel mean the theological gospel, the gospel stated in 
creedal propositions, the gospel which shuts itself up within the 
limitations of orthodox speech. They mean: give us the old 
gospel in contradistinction from any new message, from any- 
thing like modern higher criticism, the old gospel in its straight- 

91 



92 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

ness and primness and exactness and perpendicularity, and give 
us that old gospel in such fashion as that men shall be regarded 
as heretical and worthy of excommunication who dare to de- 
part in its interpretation from the clearly denned limitations 
in which it has been placed by the creeds. 

Well, if such a gospel were given today it would mean a 
return to medieval Christianity; it would mean once again the 
era of the rack and the thumbscrew in the name of Him who 
showed His pierced hands to a weary world. That old gospel 
is not to be identified with the oldest gospel, the primitive 
gospel, which seems to me to be tolerant of everything save 
wickedness, tolerant of everything save hindrances to the en- 
trance of its message of life and good will into the hearts and 
lives of men. 

But did it ever occur to you that the people who are asking 
today for the old gospel, under the pretense of deep concern 
with reference to the welfare of the church, are those who 
mean by the old gospel an innocuous gospel, a harmless gospel, 
a gospel that will in no way interfere with their pleasures, 
their business, their government, their social and industrial 
life? It is from this class we hear the cry: let the shoemaker 
stick to his last; let the preacher give unto us Jesus Christ and 
him crucified; let the church keep out of politics! It is from 
this class, in most pious fashion, that the demand is made for 
the lessening of the "impertinent" interference on the part of 
the church with secular concerns as contradistinguished from 
ecclesiastical concerns. Was there ever such a preposterous 
demand ? Was there ever such a senseless and utterly impossible 
demand? I hear one saying: let the painter keep to his colors! 
What do you mean? Shall the painter simply play with his 
colors? Shall he take these colors and with his brush simply, 
without signification of meaning, place them upon his canvas? 
How can the painter stick to his colors if he does not recognize 
the right to use those colors in throwing upon the canvas a 
human face, a glorious cathedral, a magnificent landscape? 
When you tell the painter to stick to his colors you give him 
the immediate right to use those colors in reproducing any 



EDWARD LINDSAY POWELL 93 

concrete object that he may wish to present to the admiration 
and appreciation of mankind. 

Let the preacher stick to his gospel ! True. You say to the 
man who is sowing seed: "Let the farmer keep to his seed. 
What has he to do with sunshine and shower? Let him stick 
to his seed, let him handle his seed, let him hold his seed, but do 
not let him sow his seed." There is no sort of relationship 
between the earth and seed, and therefore, let the sower of 
seed regard himself as the simple depositary of the seed which 
he holds in his hand! Isn't it ridiculous? How can a man 
stick to the gospel and keep that gospel apart from life and all 
of its relationships ? How can he preach Jesus Christ and him 
crucified and have no concern whatever with reference to 
social, industrial, governmental or domestic concerns? How 
shall he preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and leave it without 
any field of operation, without any soil upon which the seed of 
the word may be cast? 

For one, I would say, let him be accused, in the language of 
Paul, who preaches any other than the old gospel, but the very 
purpose of the old gospel, that which makes it to have any 
meaning whatsoever, is that it shall grapple with all the condi- 
tions of life and deal with all the concerns of life in order that 
these conditions and concerns and activities may be saved and 
redeemed from all that is wrong and all that is sinful. 

There are many among the uncircumcised who come to the 
church and say: give us the old gospel, the gospel that will let 
us alone, the gospel of laissez faire, the gospel that concerns 
itself with stars and angels, but not with streets and business ; 
the gospel that has to do with heavenly music and will not 
even go so far as to put forth an effort to introduce sweet 
strains among the mechanical and commercial aims and noises 
of earth ! Stick to the old gospel ! 

I have yet to hear that cry coming honestly and sincerely 
from souls that are interested in the redemption of the world, 
and in making the kingdoms of this world and the governments 
of this world the kingdoms and governments of our Lord and 
Savior Jesus Christ, Now the old gospel for the new age is 



94 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

simply the old gospel adapted to the new occasions and the 
new duties and the new conditions and the new relationships 
which the age brings with it. 

I should say that the gospel for the new age unquestionably 
must be the permeative gospel. The significance of my text 
begins now to be apparent. "His train filled the whole Tem- 
ple!" Isaiah had been accustomed to thinking of God on a 
throne high and lifted up, but it seems to come as a culmina- 
tion of his vision when the conception dawned upon him of 
the presence of God not in one part of the Temple but the 
whole Temple. He had been taught to think of the presence of 
God in the inner court, in the sanctuary, in the Holy of Holies, 
in the place of worship and prayer; but the thought of God's 
throne with its shining glory filling the whole Temple, bringing 
under its influence the outer court with all its activities and 
functions, the outer court, where were found the money chang- 
ers whom Christ drove therefrom, that to him was the new con- 
ception, and that is the new accent which the gospel places 
upon its message today. 

The gospel of Jesus Christ has the right to permeate all life, 
all departments of life, all the activities and concerns of life, 
and it is more and more emphasizing the fact that the claim of 
Jesus Christ is so imperative that nothing short of God's pres- 
ence and his will filling the whole temple of human society 
and the whole temple of humanity will meet the obligations 
and responsibilities of the church of Jesus Christ. 

"We have come to a time, thank God, when the line of sharp 
demarcation between the sacred and the secular is being ef- 
faced; effaced by virtue of the fact that the spirit of the 
gospel of Jesus Christ gets into that realm which is known as 
secular and immediately it becomes sacred. More and more 
the secular, through the permeative influence of the gospel of 
Jesus Christ is becoming sacred. I have known a secular pulpit ; 
I have known a secular pew, and what has made it secular ? The 
absence of the actual recognition in all of its life and worship 
of the mind and will and spirit of Jesus Christ. Its ecclesias- 
tical forms did not make it sacred, its ecclesiastical offices and 



EDWARD LINDSAY POWELL 95 

functions did not make it sacred. It became sacred only when 
his train, his presence filled the house, every part of the 
house, all of the relationships with which the house had to do 
and with which the great divine institution called the church is 
concerned. 

A primitive gospel! I do not believe in the union of the 
Church and State. The gospel of Jesus Christ would not join 
together that which God hath put asunder. The State has to 
do with legislation and administration. With that the Church 
has not to do. But the Church has to do with influencing the 
character of the legislation and influencing the powers that be, 
to the extent that they shall presently become the powers that 
ought to be. The gospel does not at all enter as an interloper, 
the gospel does not come to interfere with the offices or with 
the administration or with the functions of the State, but it 
demands in the name of Him who is the Way and the Truth 
and the Life, the right to bring its message to bear in influ- 
ential fashion upon every department of government, upon 
every department of legislation. That is what I mean by the 
old gospel for a new age. 

A gospel that like the ocean fills every nook and corner and 
crevice of the shore line of humanity, a gospel that will not 
be forbidden to exercise its sacred influence upon any part of 
the life of any part of the world, a gospel which will not recog- 
nize as alien to its power anything in business, in humanity, in 
government, in civilization. That is the explanation of the 
foreign missionary movement. When we talk about foreign 
missions what do we mean? We mean that we have a gospel, 
which, by right of the sufferings of Jesus Christ and by right 
of the privileges and blessings which shall come through an 
acceptance of Jesus Christ in the civilization of these old coun- 
tries and these heathen nations, by that right we demand en- 
trance there and we go there. We seek to bring all of that 
civilization, if so it may be called, under the sway and the 
influence, under the mind and will of Jesus Christ. 

Once again this old gospel for the new age must be a free 
gospel. I do not mean that there is not among us freedom of 



96 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

utterance in the proclamation of the gospel. We have that: 
we had to fight for it. We can preach the gospel now, no man 
daring to molest or make us afraid. But I mean bj T a free gos- 
pel one that shall have free course to run and to be glorified, a 
gospel that shall have hindrances which legislation can remove 
taken away, so that the gospel may enter with its saving and 
regenerative and redeeming power into human life. 

It seems to me that there are only two ways to remove these 
hindrances, and so to make possible a free gospel to work in 
the social body. There is the way of public opinion. When 
public opinion becomes on a level with the moral ideal, it 
becomes prohibitive of the evils that are sought to be rebuked. 
It becomes prohibitive apart even from legislation. I mean 
this: When Paul would rebuke sectarianism in the church at 
Corinth, he held up the beauty of union, the ideal of the church 
united as one body, having love for the Christ so intense and 
passionate as to make love for each other normal and possible. 
Sectarianism was rebuked; sectarianism was condemned; sec- 
tarianism was prohibited by the brightness of an ideal that 
could be attained and grasped and actually brought into 
exercise. 

There has come today in this age a new social ideal which 
condemns prohibitively any sort of industrialism that inter- 
feres with the inherent rights of man. There has come an 
economic ideal which prohibits, for instance, child labor. There 
has come a moral ideal which embraces all of these other ideals 
so imperative in its character that certain evils which were 
condoned a generation ago are made impossible in the life of the 
twentieth century conscience, which is nothing more than 
twentieth century public opinion. I say that concrete evils in 
business or in government, can be removed as the ideal be- 
comes imperative, and the ideal is simply public opinion de- 
manding in the name of its higher conception of truth and 
righteousness that these evils shall not exist. 

But whenever that point is reached immediately legislation 
comes on the stage and that which is public opinion in its pro- 
hibitive character is put into statutory enactment, and society 



EDWARD LINDSAY POWELL 97 

says these evils shall not be. I believe legislation can do no 
more than that. It can embody the conscience of a generation 
in its code and thus remove concrete obstacles and hindrances 
that are evil and infamous, making possible the full and free 
stride of the gospel into human society and into human life. 

We are told by a brilliant editor that legislation cannot 
make possible goodness, that men cannot be made good by act 
of assembly. Right! Splendidly right! Gloriously right! 
No man has ever been made good by act of assembly; no man 
has ever been made morally better by act of assembly; no man 
has ever been so much as touched in the redemption of his life 
from the grip of sin by act of assembly. All that act of assem- 
bly can do is to take out of the way concrete hindrances which 
legislation can destroy. Thus we can make possible the en- 
trance of the gospel, with its saving and redeeming power, 
that gospel which alone can break the fetters which bind a 
human soul, that gospel alone which can truly make men free. 
"Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free." 
The gospel of love, awakening penitence and obedience, is the 
only power in the universe that can set men free from sin. 

And so I say again, in conclusion, that the old gospel with 
its tender note, has not ceased ; the old gospel with its punitive 
note, the penalty consequent upon departure from creedal propo- 
sitions, is entirely out of date, and is so dead that no resurrec- 
tion angel's trumpet can ever bring it back to an enlightened 
humanity. The gospel of aloofness, the academic gospel, the 
gospel that withdraws itself from the concerns of life, under 
the supposition that it is too sacred to enter into those con- 
cerns, is impossible for the very reason that it leaves the gospel 
without anything to do, it leaves the gospel without any com- 
mission, it makes absurd — I was about to use the word blas- 
phemous — the commission of Jesus Christ to go into all the 
world and preach the gospel. 

Jesus did not send these men forth on a fool's errand and to 
say in parrot-fashion, Jesus Christ lived and Jesus Christ died 
and Jesus Christ was buried and Jesus Christ rose from the 
dead, and now what of it? 



98 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

What of it has to be answered in the preaching of Jesus 
Christ and him crucified, and what does it mean to business 
that Jesus Christ died ? What does it mean to corrupt politics 
that Jesus Christ died? What does it mean to wickedness in 
high places that Jesus Christ died? Does a man get into 
politics when he talks about the crucifixion of Christ and its 
condemnation of political conspiracy and political corruption? 
How in the name of God must you preach the gospel of Jesus 
Christ? By keeping it in prison? By keeping it shut within 
four walls? By making of it a mere literary presentation of a 
beautiful message? 

I am reminded of Mark Twain's very admirable interpreta- 
tion of modern academic conventional and professional Chris- 
tianity. "The present Christianity," he says, "makes an ex- 
cellent private Christian, but its endeavors to make an excel- 
lent public one, go for nothing substantially." This is an 
honest nation — in private life! The American Christian is a 
straight and clean and honest man, and in his private com- 
merce with his fellows, can be trusted to stand faithfully by 
the principles of honor and honesty imposed upon him by his 
religion. But the moment he comes forward to exercise a pub- 
lic trust he can be confidently counted upon to betray that trust 
in nine cases out of ten if ' ' party loyalty ' ' shall require it. If 
there are two tickets in the field in his city, one composed 
of honest men and the other of notorious blatherskites and 
criminals, he will not hesitate to lay his private Christian honor 
aside and vote for the blatherskites if his ' ' party honor ' ' shall 
exact it. His Christianity is of no use to him and has no influ- 
ence upon him when he is acting in a public capacity. 

That is what I mean by a permeative gospel. Here is an im- 
possible thing suggested that a man can be a Christian man in 
his private capacity, and a rascal in his public capacity. Pos- 
sible for him to be all that the gospel of Jesus Christ demands 
as a private citizen, and yet be a corrupt politician on election 
day. Possible for him to be respected and honored by his fel- 
low-citizens and be a robber of widows and orphans in his 
business. Is such a thing conceivable? And yet the very 



EDWARD LINDSAY POWELL 99 

effort of those who are asking us to preach the old gospel, I 
mean the effort of those in that class of people who are asking 
us to preach the old gospel means nothing short of this: Make 
of your gospel a light and give it to the world as a light, and 
say to the world we have no right to concern ourselves with 
your public capacities; we are only concerned in your indi- 
vidual relationships and those relationships do not extend at 
all to your business or to your home or to your government; 
they extend simply to your manner of worship in the church. 

If only you will say your prayers and read your Bible and 
go to Sunday school and attend prayer meeting and give your 
money nothing more is required by the gospel of Christ. 

We would thus be saying to the world that our gospel is so 
infinitesimal in its grip upon anyone as to be absolutely harm- 
less, nothing better than a sweet-scented geranium, and that 
God gave his only begotten Son to be crucified in order to make 
it possible for us to build such a house as this and to have such 
a message as that go forth from it. The world, with all of its 
concerns and activities, is to be and should be redeemed 
through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ making known God's 
good will to man and demanding that the world should inter- 
pret its life and its duties and its responsibilities in terms of 
him who thus loved us and gave himself for us. 



WILLIAM HENRY BOOK 

IN this age ability is measured by accomplishment. No matter what a 
man may claim for himself, if what he accomplishes falls short of a high 
standard, the world will not wait for him to explain the difference between 
his ideals and the realization of these ideals. He will be told that the 
twentieth century does not recognize any ideals, no matter how beautiful 
they may appear, if he cannot or will not make them practical in realiza- 
tion. In fact, every preacher is now tried by the military rule of measure- 
ment, and that rule is Success. This may seem hard to some, but it is 
the divine rule in testing character. "Every man shall be tried by his 
works, whether they be good, or whether they be evil." 

Now if the subject of this sketch be tried by this practical rule, he 
certainly will have no reason to fear the public verdict. Few men have 
accomplished more under like conditions than has W. H. Book, the son of 
Henry L. and Mary E. Book. He was born in Newcastle, Va., July 4, 1863, 
the day after his father fell in the fatal Pickett charge at Gettysburg. In 
November, 1882, he preached his first sermon, having attended Milligan 
College, Tenn. He has held the following pastorates: Pulaski, Va., where 
he remained six years and built a beautiful house of worship, the con- 
gregation growing from 18 to more than 400 members. Clifton Forge, Va., 
five years of fruitful ministry. Martinsville, Va., five years. Here the 
house of worship was remodeled, a parsonage secured and many added to 
the church. W. H. Book has given much of his time to general evangelistic 
work, but is now in his twelfth year at Columbus, Ind. Here he has 
added hundreds to the church and done much in missions, besides com- 
pleting a $12,000.00 addition to the church building and securing a $5,000 
parsonage. He has been blest with a fine family of five boys and five girls. 

As a preacher Mr. Book's style is eminently practical. He cares little 
for ornamentation, and even less for philosophy. He has no use for any- 
thing that does not immediately help to drive home the great truths of the 
Bible. He is sometimes dogmatic, but he will tell you that no one can be 
otherwise who has a positive gospel to preach, and as this is the kind of 
gospel he preaches, he must sometimes appear to be very positive in his 
style. But W. H. Book makes no apologies for his style. Indeed, he cares 
nothing whatever for public appreciation if this is to be gained by the 
sacrifice of truth, but he knows how to get down to the people and win 
them for Christ. 

While his academic scholarship is not of the highest, yet he is a thought- 
ful reader of the best books, and is especially an earnest student of the 
Bible. 

101 



THE PREACHER AND HIS MESSAGE 

By William Henry Book 

Text. — "And the word of Jehovah came unto Jonah the second 
time, saying, Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and 
preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee." — Jonah 3 :1, 2. 

TEE Preacher. The preacher is one who assembles or con- 
venes a crowd; one who cries out — proclaims, heralds. In 
olden times the prophets were the preachers. He is made out 
of the same material of which others are made, in spite of the 
fact that the world has divided us into male, female and 
preacher. He is human, but is filled with a heavenly message. 
His work is not a profession but a calling. He is not the 
hired servant of the church but of the Lord Jesus Christ. He 
preaches because he can not help it. When he resigns the 
ministry to enter any other field he has taken a downward step. 
That was to me a great day when Elder P. B. Baber placed his 
hand upon my head and said, "This boy will preach some day." 
There I stood, a barefooted, ragged, ignorant boy. Somehow 
I grew inches in a minute ! I preach ? Could it be true ? This 
good man had said so and I believed him, and I determined to 
not disappoint him. I promised God if he would let me preach 
his word that I would do it if I went to the poorhouse, and 
when I got there that I would organize the forces and be the 
pastor of that flock. If I could live my life over again, and 
knew that I could select a profession that would make me 
worth millions, or that to be a minister of Jesus Christ I must 
suffer hardships, die in poverty and then be buried in the pot- 
ter's field, I w r ould choose to be a preacher. Nothing could 
bring me more joy than to know that my five sons are en- 
gaged in the work of the ministry. I'd rather be a plain min- 
ister of the gospel than be the president of the United States. 
A Man of Conviction. The preacher must be a man of con- 

103 



104 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

viction. He must believe in his message. When he speaks he 
must convince his hearers that he is deeply in earnest and that 
he believes every word he utters. A preacher asked a clown 
why it was he could tell a lie, when the people knew it to be a 
lie, and they would laugh and cry, while he would tell the 
truth and they would not be moved. The clown replied: "I 
tell a lie just like I believed it were the truth and you tell the 
truth just like you believed it were a lie." The man who 
preaches interrogation points will make doubters and empty 
the pews of his church. The world has more respect for the 
man who preaches his beliefs even though it does not believe 
his message, than it will have for the man who preaches its 
beliefs when it knows that the preacher does not believe what he 
preaches. It is the man who dogmatizes rather than the milk 
and cider, namby-pamby, wishy-washy, masculine formed and 
feminine-toned preacher who does things in the world. When 
Joseph Hume was twitted for going to hear John Brown, the 
celebrated Scotch preacher, he said, "I do not believe all he 
says, but he does ; and once a week, at least, I like to hear a man 
who believes what he says. Why, whatever I think, that man 
preaches as though he felt the Lord Jesus Christ were just at 
his elbow." 

A Man of Courage. Jonah did not want to obey God. He 
had to be whaled before he would obey. He was anti-mission- 
ary. Sometimes it is not pleasant to preach the truth. It may 
make the preacher unpopular. "Woe be unto you when all 
men speak well of you." This is a sure sign of a cowardly 
preacher. The man who preaches the truth will disturb the 
devil, cause a sensation in hell and make for himself enemies. 
Of course the preacher is tempted to preach sermons that will 
call forth applause rather than groans, but if he surrenders 
truth to be popular he becomes a traitor. Suppose he should 
try to please his congregation what would be the result? 
When he had cut out all of the Scripture that applied he would 
have nothing left but two book backs. It is the business of the 
preacher to turn the world right side up. He must be ag- 
gressive, an agitator, and that means to rub the wrong way. 



WILLIAM HENRY BOOK 105 

This will cause irritation and irritation causes inflammation 
and inflammation calls for investigation and investigation pro- 
duces an explanation and an explanation results in a reforma- 
tion, out of which comes regeneration, salvation, sanctification 
and glorification. Preach the truth and the world may abuse 
you, but down deep in their hearts they will respect you. 

Paul prayed for boldness. .His exhortation is to " Stand; 
quit ye like men, be strong. ' ' He never allowed popularity or 
salary to influence his preaching. When the brethren tried to 
keep him from going to Jerusalem he said: "What mean ye to 
weep and to break my heart ? For I am ready not to be bound 
only, but also to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord 
Jesus. ' ' 

His Business. It is that of pastor, executive, leader, teacher, 
preacher. It is the work of the teacher to make you to see the 
truth; but it is the work of the preacher to make you to be the 
truth. He is a molder of character. Paul speaks of him as a 
builder. See the stone cutter with chisel and hammer in 
hand. Watch him as he drives the instrument into the rock. 
I ask him why do you hit so hard? Is it just to see the chips 
fly? "No," he replies. "I am trying to make this ugly, 
crooked stone fit into this beautiful building, and I have to cut 
and chisel a lot of it away in order that it may be made beau- 
tiful and useful. So it is with the preacher, he sees in his con- 
gregation a soul, a character, that is ugly, crooked, all out of 
proportion ; he sees that it can be made to fit into God's spiritual 
temple, and for this reason he hits hard, cuts deep, hurts and 
makes the chips fly. He does it because it is absolutely 
necessary. 

He is an artist. See that painter with brush in hand — watch 
him make the strokes. I ask him, "Why do you do this? Is it 
your desire to make graceful strokes?" "No," he says, "I 
see on this canvas an angel face and every stroke of the brush 
is to develop the outline. The preacher sees in the faces of 
members of his audience beautiful characters which need to be 
developed. He does not study to make a graceful stroke but a 
telling stroke. 



106 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Like the physician, he must study his patient and prepare the 
medicine accordingly. What would you do if you were to call 
a physician and he should say, "I have some stuff with me 
which I have given to others and I'll just try it on you." 
I would send that physician away. I want him to come and 
make a thorough diagnosis. I would have him feel my pulse, 
listen to my heart beats, look at my tongue, thump me over and 
then treat my symptoms. I might not like the medicine, some 
of the pills might not be sugar-coated, and some of the quinine 
might not be given in capsules, the medicine might be dis- 
agreeable and make me sick, but if it corrected the trouble and 
made me well that would strengthen my faith in that physician. 
The preacher's business is to treat sin-sick souls. He should 
study each patient and when he has located the trouble give 
the medicine. He may have in his parish some chronic patients 
upon whom medicine has lost its effect; then he should give 
spiritual osteopathic treatment. There may be some who have 
stiff necks, who are stubborn and self-willed, and others who 
have rheumatism of the heart, one symptom of which is a con- 
tracted pocketbook. These need to be massaged often and the 
diseased part should receive special attention. The preacher 
should have always in view the end, which is reconstructed 
manhood and womanhood. He should create in his hearers a 
desire to he and to do. His work is not to entertain. Think 
of a man going into a hospital and standing in the presence of 
the surgeons and nurses to be entertained ! I fancy I hear the 
surgeons say: "This is no place for entertainment, but a place 
of life and death ! The church is a spiritual hospital where dis- 
eased and sin-sick souls are being treated. That preacher who 
stands before the mirror practicing his gestures and admiring 
himself may appear unto men to be preaching but unto God he 
must give account as one who has failed. Listen to the greatest 
preacher since Christ: "Do I seek to please men? If I yet 
please men, I should not be the servant of Christ." (Gal. 1:10.) 

Hear him again: "But as we were allowed of God to be put 
in trust with the gospel, even so we speak ; not as pleasing men, 
but God, which trieth our hearts. For neither at any time 



WILLIAM HENRY BOOK 107 

used we flattering words, as ye know, nor a cloak of covetous- 
ness; God is witness: nor of men sought we glory, neither of 
you, nor yet of others, when we might have been burdensome, 
as the apostles of Christ." (1 Thess. 2:4-6.) 

The Message. God's messengers are sent forth with a burn- 
ing, heart-searching, sin-condemning, life-giving, conscience- 
awakening, personal message. It is positive rather than nega- 
tive. It is not what the people want, but what they need. The 
people want to be left alone in their sins, undisturbed. They 
demand that the preacher shall speak smooth sayings. They 
like polish and flattery; opiates from the devil's medicine box 
which put the conscience to sleep. The prophets, John the 
Baptist, and the apostles were men who went forth to herald 
God's thoughts into the ears of wicked men and women. John 
was only a voice crying in the wilderness. His preaching was 
God's voice crying through humanity. When God sent Jonah 
to Nineveh he gave him a message. His business was to de- 
liver this message and not his own. When Peter preached on 
the Day of Pentecost he looked into the faces of those wicked 
Jews and told them they had taken and with wicked hands 
had killed the Lord of glory. He branded them as murderers. 
He was not speaking his own thoughts but he spake as the Holy 
Spirit gave him utterance. His message was a positive one and 
it cut to the heart. It did not call forth applause but groans. 
The ones who only a few days ago pierced the side of the Son 
of God are now being pierced by the sword of the Spirit in the 
hands of Peter. God's message is "quick, and powerful, and 
sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the divid- 
ing asunder of soul and marrow, and a discerner of the thoughts 
and intents of the heart." 

There were sects in the days of the apostles and when they 
preached God's message it offended them, but the preachers did 
not trim; they preached it just as it had been given unto them, 
and they had results. The moment the preacher compromises 
God's truth he fails. The Apostolic preachers were agitators, 
they stirred up strife, the message spoken separated families, 
it brought to them persecution and often death ; but they were 
loyal. 



108 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

It Is a God-Given Message. " Preach the preaching that I 
bid thee. ' ' We must preach borrowed sermons, and if the mes- 
sage offends we can get behind the prophets, the apostles and 
God. If the people get mad then let them ask God to apologize. 
Many churches are empty today and dying of dry rot because 
the pulpit has only a human message. When we get into the 
pulpits men who are filled with the divine message, men who 
are on fire because they have come into contact with the live 
coals from off the altar, men who will be the voice of God cry- 
ing in the wilderness, men who are satisfied to preach only 
God's word, then the pews will be filled and men and women 
will be heard to cry out: "What must we do?" It is said that 
a noted preacher, a pastor of a strong church in the east, found 
his people drifting and his pews empty. He wondered the 
cause. He had been preaching on modern themes and his mes- 
sages were beautiful but lifeless. One Sunday morning he 
went into his pulpit and found on his desk this statement: 
"They have taken away my Lord and Master and I know not 
where they have laid him." He saw the point. He began to 
preach the gospel and the people returned to the house of the 
Lord. 

Only One Thing to Preach. Listen to this solemn charge: 
"I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus 
Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appear- 
ing and his Kingdom; preach the word; be instant in season, 
out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering 
and doctrine, for the time will come when they will not endure 
sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to 
themselves teachers, having itching ears ; and they shall turn away 
their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables. But 
watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an 
evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry." (2 Tim. 4:1-5.) 
Surely we are living in the days foretold in the prophecy. 
When we think of Joe Smith, Mary Moss Baker Eddy, Pastor 
Russell, the "Holy Rollers," the "Burning Bushmen," the so- 
called "New Thought" egotists and the many other religious 
freaks we feel the importance of knowing God's word and 



WILLIAM HENRY BOOK 109 

preaching it just as it is. Turn on the light and the darkness 
will be dispelled. Do you want to create a sensation? Do 
you want to preach something new? Then preach the gospel. 
In many communities it has not been heard in an age. 

The Old Gospel. There is only one gospel to preach. Every- 
thing necessary to a sinner's salvation is contained in this gos- 
pel. It is God's power unto salvation to every one that be- 
lieves it. (Rom. 1:16.) Peter preached it on the Day of Pente- 
cost; he preached it at the household of Cornelius when he 
spake words whereby they might be saved. Paul preached it 
in Philippi when he spake unto them the word of the Lord. 
Jesus had promised his apostles to send unto them the Holy 
Spirit who would bring all things to their remembrance, guide 
them into all truth, and when the Spirit came he revealed unto 
the apostles the whole gospel — a complete gospel. Until the 
Day of Pentecost the gospel was wrapped in mystery and 
none understood. Now it is a revelation and not a mystery or 
a secret. (See 1 Cor. 2:6-14.) It has been revealed unto the 
apostles by the Holy Spirit. Until the Spirit came the apostles 
were represented in the natural or uninspired man ; after he came 
upon them they became the spiritual or inspired men. The 
Holy Spirit uncovered and revealed the hidden mystery and 
this secret is the gospel which they preached. There has not 
been given to the world one new thought since the apostolic 
age as touching man's redemption. The apostles were the 
ambassadors of the King. Paul's instruction to the young 
evangelist was: "What thou hast learned of me the same com- 
mit thou unto faithful men who shall be able to teach others 
also." The apostles spake as the Spirit gave them utterance 
and we must speak as the apostles give us utterance. 

Paul says : ' ' Though we or an angel from heaven preach any 
other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto 
you, let him be accursed." (Gal. 1:8.) "Woe be unto me if I 
preach not the gospel. ' ' Emphasis on the gospel. Woe unto me 
if I preach anything other than the gospel. 

A Whole Gospel. The apostle says: " For I have not shunned 
to declare unto you all the counsel of God. "The gospel con- 



110 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

sists of facts to be believed, commands to be obeyed and prom- 
ises to be enjoyed. Philip began at the same Scripture and 
preached unto him Jesus. I fancy I can hear this faithful 
preacher as he delivers this wonderful message to this one man. 
I can hear him say: This is the same Jesus spoken of by all 
the prophets; this is the same Jesus who was born of the 
virgin Mary and cradled in a manger; this is the same Jesus 
who was taken into Egypt to escape the hand of the wicked 
king, Herod; this is the same Jesus who stood in the Temple 
and disputed with the doctors of the law; this is the same 
Jesus who was baptized in the Jordan when the heavens were 
opened and the voice of the Father said: "This is my beloved 
Son in whom I am well pleased;" this is the same Jesus who 
was in the mountain forty days tempted of the devil; this is 
the same Jesus who went about everywhere doing good — open- 
ing the eyes of the blind, unstopping the ears of the deaf, loos- 
ing the tongue of the dumb, making the lame to walk and 
bringing to life those who were dead; this is the same Jesus 
who gathered about him twelve apostles and taught them as 
touching his kingdom; this is the same Jesus who was perse- 
cuted by the Jews; arrested and brought before Pilate, made 
to wear the purple robe, the crown of thorns, was spit upon, 
mocked, scourged and nailed to the cross and killed; this is 
the same Jesus who was buried in the new tomb and on the 
third day came out of the grave and showed himself alive by 
many infallible proofs; this is the same Jesus who when as- 
sembled with his apostles on the mountain top said: "Go ye 
into all the world and preach the gospel unto every creature 
and he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, and he 
was received up into heaven." I think that it was then the 
Ethiopian officer said: "Here is the water, what doth hinder 
me from being baptized?" and then the preacher said, "If 
thou believest thou mayest," and he said, "I believe Jesus 
Christ is the Son of God," and it was then they went down into 
the water and the preacher baptized the eunuch. 

His Aim. Paul's aim should be the aim of every preacher. 
Speaking of Christ he says: "Whom we preach, warning ev- 



WILLIAM HENRY BOOK 111 

ery man, and teaching every man in all wisdom; that we may 
present every man perfect in Christ Jesus; whereunto I labor, 
striving according to his working, which worketh in me 
mightily." (Col. 1:28.) He had an anxiety for the church. 
He expected that false teachers would get into the flock and 
that some would be drawn away. We hear him say: "Take 
heed to yourselves, and to all the flock, over which the Holy 
Spirit hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, 
which he hath purchased with his own blood. For I know this, 
that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among 
you, not sparing the flock. Also of your ownselves shall men 
arise speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after 
them. Therefore watch, and remember, that by the space of 
three years I ceased not to warn everyone night and day with 
tears. And now I commend you to God, and the word of his 
grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an in- 
heritance among all them which are sanctified." (Acts 
20:28-32.) 

"Would to God you could bear with me a little in my folly; 
and indeed bear with me. For I am jealous over you with 
godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that 
I might present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. But I fear, 
lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his 
subtility, so your minds should be corrupted from the sim- 
plicity that is in Christ. For if he that cometh preach any 
other Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive an- 
other spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel 
which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him." 
(2 Cor. 11:1-10.) 

Should Contend for It. See 2 Tim. 3 ; Tit. 1 :9-13 ; 2 :1 ; Jude. 
"Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the 
common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you and 
to exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith 
which was once for all delivered unto the saints." "Once for 
all delivered." We need not expect any other revelation. This 
verse settles Mrs. Eddy and Joe Smith and all of their kind. 

When we remember the suffering of Paul and his exhortation 



112 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

we can not sacrifice the truth ; when we remember the suffering 
of our Lord we must be faithful. Yes; if we must tramp the 
streets and preach on the street corners and make a living by 
mending tents and die in poverty and at last be buried in the 
potter's field and our names be forgotten by the people, let us 
be true to the old and yet always new gospel. 

The Reward. "They that win many to righteousness shall 
shine as the stars of the firmament." One evening a 
young woman in a fashionable society home was standing in 
front of a beautiful mirror adjusting a handsome diamond in 
her hair that it might shine with brilliancy. She noticed re- 
flected in the mirror the face of her little sister Anna. Anna 
was watching with profound interest. The lady turned and 
said: "What are you thinking about, sister?" The little tot 
replied: "I am thinking about what my Sunday school teacher 
told me Sunday." "What did she tell you?" "She said, if 
I could win a soul for Jesus I'd have a star in my crown and I 
am just wondering if my star will not outshine your diamond. ' ' 
The young woman went to the ball, and late in the night she 
came home tired and dissatisfied — this old world never does 
satisfy — and when she went into her room she saw the little 
sister asleep in her bed. She threw herself across the bed and 
cried: "Lord, have mercy. I am so tired of this world ! Will 
you not let me be the star in sister's crown?" The Lord heard 
her prayer, and she put her arms around the little child and 
said: "Wake up, sister, wake up! God has let me be the 
star in your crown." The Sunday school teacher received her 
reward in the little girl and the little girl received her reward 
in the conversion of her sister. Paul said the members of the 
Thessalonica church were his crown of rejoicing. 



CAREY ELMORE MORGAN 

CAREY E. MORGAN can and does do nearly everything well. In addi- 
tion to fulfilling the duties of an important pastorate, he is more or 
less associated with many of the enterprises of the Disciples, as the fol- 
lowing record shows: 

Carey Elmore Morgan, born in Johnson County, Indiana, August 21, 
1860. Educated in a country school, in the high school at Indianapolis, and 
at Butler College, getting the A.B. degree from that institution in 1883, 
and the degree of M.A. from the same institution in 1885. Married Miss 
Ella May Dailey October 11, 1883. Three children. Two sons, Carey and 
Walter D., both of New York City. One daughter, Ruth, now Mrs. Fielding 
G. Gordon, of Nashville, Tennessee. Went to first appointment to preach 
New Year's Day, 1886. Located shortly afterwards as minister of the 
churches at Arcadia and Atlanta, Ind. Began work in Wabash, Ind., in 
1887. Went to Portland Avenue Church, Minneapolis, Minn., in 1894. 
Went to the Seventh Street Church, Richmond, Va., in 1899. To Paris. 
Ky., in 1903. Began his ministry with the Vine Street Christian Church, 
Nashville, Tennessee, January 1, 1912. This is the greatest work of his 
life. A curator of Transylvania University since 1904. Vice-president of 
the Christian Unity Commission of the Disciples of Christ since its or- 
ganization. Member of the Advisory Board for the National Society for 
Broader Education. Trustee of the American-Christian Missionary Society 
since the Buffalo Convention. President of the American Christian Mis- 
sionary Society, 1914-15. Has spoken often at the International Conven- 
tion of the church. Has been actively related to all the missionary enter- 
prises of the brotherhood. Has traveled and studied abroad. 

Notwithstanding his activities in many fields of labor he has never writ- 
ten a book, nor edited a paper, so far as his record gives. Perhaps his 
most useful labors have been in pastoral work. He is a wise, conservative, 
and popular pastor. He has some gifts as an evangelist though his uncer- 
tain health has prevented him from undertaking very much work in the 
evangelistic field. He is eminently suited for church work and adheres 
faithfully to its demands. 

As a speaker, his words are as clear as sunlight, and as warm as sun- 
shine. His arguments are generally logically set forth, but these are re- 
enforeed with a heart power which is almost irresistible. 



113 




Brer your frieni, 



MAN ApMD T;HE BOOK 

By Carey E. Morgan 

Text. — "But one hath somewhere testified, saying, What is man, 
that thou art mindful of him? Or the son of man, that thou 
visit est him?" — Hebrews 2:6. 

THE Bible has two great themes. Its first theme is God. 
He appears in the opening verse and thence on he holds 
the place of primacy. Its second theme is man. He appears 
in the first chapter and thenceforward he crowds the sacred 
page. Much more space is given to the second theme than to 
the first; as if it were more difficult to reveal man to himself 
than to reveal God to man. 

All that is said about man in these crowded pages can be put 
under one of five propositions : (1) Man is created in the image 
of God. (2) He is a free moral agent. (3) He is responsible to 
God for the use he makes of his freedom. (4) Sin is his enemy 
and puts him in peril. (5) The peril of sin is his need of sal- 
vation. 

It is the purpose of this sermon to fix each of these proposi- 
tions in the teaching of the Scriptures and to show how each, 
in turn, is approved and confirmed. 



Man is created in the divine image. 

Just as the universe takes on new meaning when you relate 
it to God, so human life takes on new dignity when you affirm 
its divine origin. I cling to every word in the Holy Book that 
exalts man. If it says he was "made only a little lower than 
the angel,' ' that he was "clothed with glory and honor,"- — 
that he was given "dominion over every living thing," — that 
he was "created in the image of God" and became immortal 
with the breath of God, — I want to hide that word in my heart 

115 



116 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

and build my life around it. That word is a seed and there 
are whole gardens in it and orchards and harvests. How a 
man can get any blessing out of the thought that he is wholly 
physical, any enrichment of life, any spur to ambition, any 
widening of his horizon, any strength for climbing, any aspira- 
tion, any great motive, any authoritative ideals, anything great 
or good or beautiful, is more than I can make out. I am as cer- 
tain as I could be about anything that that whole conception 
has the down-pulling grip of gravity. To relate man to God is 
to pull him up toward God: to relate him to the beasts of the 
field is to link him to their life. If that is not true, I do not 
know anything that is true. 

1. When the Bible affirms that man is made in the image of 
God, of course it is not speaking of the physical man. But 
the Bible does teach that God fashioned these mortal bodies; 
and when you recall the mystery which we call growth, by 
which a child becomes a man, — lengthening the bone — tough- 
ening the muscle — multiplying the brain cells — tuning the 
nerves, increasing weight and strength; when you think of the 
eye and the ear, those marvelous contrivances by means of 
which light and sound are let into the brain and the brain is 
brought into touch with all things outside itself ; when you con- 
sider the mysterious chemical processes of digestion and assimi- 
lation, by which food becomes bone, brawn and brain; and 
when you think how the blood corpuscles, like little boats, are 
loaded with that wonderful thing called life, — surely, it is not 
difficult to believe that it is all the plan and result of Infinite 
Wisdom. 

2. But the image of God is not found in the physical in man, 
but in the intellectual and spiritual. 

(a) Because of our intellectual endowments, we can think 
God's thoughts. That's a high claim to set up for man, and if 
it is true, it surely goes far toward establishing the fact of his 
intellectual kinship with God. 

What was Euclid doing when he made his great discoveries 
in mathematics? Did he originate anything new in mathe- 
matics ? Is there anything in mathematics newer than the crea- 



CAREY ELMORE MORGAN 117 

tion? Is not the multiplication table as old as the universe? 
I affirm that he who made the universe made mathematics — that 
there is not one problem in mathematics — not the simplest, that 
can be solved other than by the rule that God made when he 
made the problem ; and that both the rule and the problem are 
as old as the world; that the mathematician did not create 
mathematics or originate even the simplest principle, and that 
every line, every angle, every rule, every problem, every loga- 
rithm, every principle in that great science is a thought of God. 
So, the mathematician is one who uncovers and discovers and 
thinks God's thoughts. If I had time I could show that this is 
true of the botanist, the geologist, the astronomer, the chemist, 
the anatomist, the psychologist, and even the historian, for his- 
tory is just God's road through the calendar, as I like to think 
the Milky Way is his road through the celestial spaces. 

(b) But the divine image is also found in the moral nature 
of man. He is so constituted that he may love what God loves 
and hate what God hates. What we call the moral sense seems 
to be primeval and fundamental in him. It is^an intuition with 
him that the true, the beautiful and the good are to be approved, 
while the false, the ugly and the evil are to be condemned. It 
is only as he departs from God and the intuitions of the moral 
sense, that the reverse comes to be true. Even the unregenerate 
man knows that selfishness is ugly, that cruelty is brutal, that 
hate is to be feared, that love, mercy, truth, and honor are to 
be preferred to their opposites. His spiritual kinship with God 
is established in this moral intuition. 

(c) He may will to do God's will. 

So, the Holy Book is right. Man sustains a triple kinship 
with God. The divine image is stamped on the intellect, the 
moral sense and the will. In thought, in moral intuition, in 
volition, man is found to oe the child of God. 

II. 

Man has within himself the power of self-control; that is, he 
is created a free, moral agent. 
1. This is the teaching of the Bible. Paul speaks of the man 



118 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

who has "power over his own will." Of himself, he says "For 
if I do this willingly, I have a reward." Writing to the dis- 
ciples at Corinth, he emphasizes their "readiness to will," and 
adds "if there be first a willing mind, etc." Peter contrasts 
the lusts of men with the will of G-od. He also speaks of the 
"will of the Gentiles." He exhorts his readers to "arm them- 
selves with the mind of Christ, ' ' which can only mean to sub- 
mit themselves to his ideals and plans and his will. He even 
says that some are "willingly ignorant." In the Hebrew let- 
ter, we read "Today, if you will hear his voice;" and again, 
"for if we sin willingly, etc." John says "He that doeth the 
will of God abideth forever." Jesus said, "If any man will 
do His will;" "If any man will come after me;" "And ye will 
not come to me, that ye might have life." He brings into con- 
trast those who hear his sayings and do them and those who 
hear, but do not. And "whosoever will" stands at the end of 
the Book as a closing appeal to man and woman who are free 
to accept or reject the invitation. 

2. The teaching of the Bible, at this point, is confirmed by 
psychology. This science of the soul of man makes it certain 
that man is furnished with all the machinery for self-control. 
The vital difference between a ship and scow is that the ship 
has engines or sails, and propellers and a rudder and a pilot 
wheel, while the scow is only a bottom for freight and is 
built to be towed. Would men put all that machinery into a 
vessel that they meant to be a scow? Why these contrivances 
for self-control, self-propulsion, self-direction, if it is meant to 
be dragged along behind by means of a rope f 

Would God put all this machinery for self-control and self- 
mastery into the soul of a man if he meant that man was to be 
hitched to some power outside of himself and dragged along 
behind? What is the reason for? And the judgment? And 
the moral sense? And the faculty of volition? Is not the soul 
furnished with machinery for self-mastery? Man can think, 
desire, choose, decide and will to act. He has the power within 
himself to do this. That proves that he is free, else you charge 
God with wasting machinery on a scow that would be suffi- 



CAREY ELMORE MORGAN 119 

cient for a ship. That would be sheer wastefulness, of which 
there is not a hint anywhere else in God's world. 

(c) But argument is scarcely needed. The practice of free- 
dom is going on before our eyes. Here is a man in the field 
he sowed with wild oats in his youth and now he bends his 
back and to the minor music of his sickle, he reaps a harvest of 
barren regrets. Was this the will of God for him? You would 
not make God responsible for this harvest? Or for the social 
evil? Or for the huge heaps of shattered hopes that clutter the 
world ? Or for the wreck of a home, which was set up in inno- 
cence, and filled, at first, with the light of love, but which was 
turned into a shambles by selfishness, or uncontrolled temper, 
or the breaking of the marriage vow? Was this the will of God 
for that home ? It would be blasphemous to say so. The prac- 
tice of freedom is going on before our eyes. Man is equipped 
with powers for self-control, for self-direction, for choice, for 
volition, for freedom. 

III. 

But man must answer to God for the use he makes of his 
freedom. 

There is one thought of God that runs through the whole 
Bible. He is Ruler over all. "The Lord God Omnipotent 
reigneth King of kings and Lord of lords." That is the in- 
terpretation of the whole thought of the inspired writers, as 
regards God's relation to the world. 

Surely, it is not hard to believe that there is a Supreme 
Mind — a Power that is authoritative everywhere, — an Infinite 
Hand that rules in all the heights and depths of space. 

1. There is no anarchy anywhere in the physical world. 
System, order, harmony and law are in evidence everywhere. 
Who launched the planets ? Who found their path for them in 
and out among the stars? Whose Mighty Hand keeps these 
huge, hurtling masses in the road marked out for them? Of 
course, if you find it easier to believe that this universe is self- 
made, that the stars lighted their own tapers, that the laws 
which science finds chiseled on the rocks and engraved on the 
vast rolls of space, enacted themselves; that the universe fell 



120 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

into system out of chaos, capriciously, by chance, by haphaz- 
ard ; if you find it easier to believe that than to believe in God, 
I may not be able to convince you, but I am sorry for you. 
"The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God." Even he 
could not say it with his head. I find it easier to believe in 
God and that his law is authoritative in all the universe. That 
is the keynote to the Bible teaching, concerning the govern- 
ment of God. He is supreme. His word is law. His authority 
is final. 

2. This teaching is confirmed by what we know about science. 
His authority is supreme in mathematics. You can get no 

angle outside of his geometry and you can solve no problem 
other than by his rule. 

His authority is supreme in art. The artist can mix his 
colors only according to God's law and must borrow his lines, 
his proportions, his perspective from the Great Artist. He 
must work according to his will, or make only a caricature. 

His authority is supreme in agriculture. You can grow corn 
only where he permits. He fixes the boundaries of your field. 
He determines the ingredients of the soil. Suppose you try to 
get a harvest in any way but his way. Try reaping in winter 
instead of autumn; try tilling rock instead of soil; try getting 
results in a dark cellar, or in a land where there is no rain; 
try ripening your grain without heat. You cannot do it. Why ? 
God will not let you. Oh ! you are free to try. You can make 
a fool of yourself if you will just as men make fools of them- 
selves who try to cultivate the soil of the soul, contrary to his 
will; but you will get no harvest in either case, but a harvest of 
barren regrets. 

3. Man is subject to law like everything else in God's 
world, only there is this difference, — man can disobey if he 
will; but always, there is the penalty. This is what is meant 
when it is said that he must answer to God for the use he 
makes of his freedom. 

There is the law that requires that a man should have food 
for the sustenance of the body. Man is always and everywhere 
subject to that law. But there is no coercion. He is not com- 



CAREY ELMORE MORGAN 121 

pelled by any power outside of himself to take food. He may 
refuse to eat, but if he does, he will starve to death. He is 
free to disobey, but always there is the penalty. He must 
answer to God and the broken law for his disobedience. 

There is the law that requires that the lungs shall have fresh 
air to feed and nourish the blood. Man is always and every- 
where subject to that law, but he may disregard it. There will 
be no interferences with his freedom, but always there is the 
penalty. 

So, he may disobey the laws of health by gluttony, by 
drunkenness; he may defile his blood. He may fill his stomach 
with liquid death: Men do that: But that does not change 
the law, or change the fact that those who disobey must an- 
swer to God and the law for their disobedience. So, a man 
may disobey God's moral law. There will be no interference 
with his freedom. Here, as elsewhere, he may throw reason to 
the winds; he may disregard the plain dictates of common 
sense ; he may do open violence to his judgment ; he may shut 
his ears to the insistent voice of conscience; he may refuse to 
accept the testimony of experience, as voiced by that wonder- 
ful phonograph of the soul, which we call memory, — but he 
must answer to God. That is the teaching of the Scriptures. 
"So, then, everyone of us shall give an account of himself to 
God." And always there is the penalty. "The way of the 
transgressor is hard." "The wages of sin is death." "The 
soul that sinneth, it shall die." 

IV. 

Sin is man's enemy and puts him in peril. 

The Bible lays sin bare and exhibits it in all its naked ugli- 
ness. It paints a black but true picture of it. It shows how 
sin led Adam and Eve to disobey God, — how it got them driven 
out of the garden of Eden and how, at the very outset, it re- 
lated itself immediately to the world's unhappiness. 

That Garden of Eden is a type of childhood's garden of in- 
nocence. My! What a place for flowers and birds' songs! 
What innocence ! What happiness ! What simple faith ! What 
visits of the angels ! It is a place where heaven and earth touch 



122 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

borders and meet and overlap. I have been in that garden 
myself. Thank God for the memory. And I have seen others 
among its flowers, with the light of an Eden's morning in their 
faces. And I have seen them driven out and always it was 
on account of sin. 

This man with the big skull and the shrunken brain and the 
face made ugly with passion was once a lad with the sunshine 
of Eden enmeshed in his golden tresses. His fine head sat on 
fine shoulders, as if he posed for an artist. The notes of his 
laughter fell from his throat in staccato, in crescendo and 
made one wonder if the laughter of angels could be fuller of 
joy. But he disobeyed God's law of life and he has been 
driven out and the angel with the flaming sword stands guard 
over the closed gate. 

This woman began her life in the garden of innocence. Her 
path, at first, was among the flowers. Angels of light were 
her playmates. The walls of this garden of youth were her 
fortress and in her face was the light of an Eden's sunrise. 
But, she sinned against God's law of purity and she has been 
driven out and the flaming sword of conscience, the flaming 
sword of public opinion, the flaming sword of God's condem- 
nation bars her return. Still men and women are being driven 
out and always it is on account of sin. 

But the Bible continues its story. Sin made Cain hate his 
brother. It made Sodom a city of degenerates. It made Lot 
a drunkard in his old age and caused him to defile his man- 
hood and to debauch his own family. It stirred the jealousy of 
the sons of Jacob and led them to commit a great crime against 
their brother Joseph. It robbed kings of their manhood, as in 
the case of Ahab, and of their crowns, as in the case of Saul. 
It made women as ferocious as wild beasts, as in the case of 
Jezebel. It split the kingdom of Israel in two and led to the 
captivity of God's chosen people, and it crucified our Lord, 
putting him to death with nail wounds, hardly big enough to 
let death in or let life out. After such fashion the Holy Book 
characterizes sin, catalogs it and condemns it. 

Its condemnations of sin are justified by experience. Did 



CAREY ELMORE MORGAN 123 

sin ever do any good thing? Did it ever help love or promote 
peace, or extend mercy, or encourage forgiveness, or urge pa- 
tience, or furnish hope, or foster courage, or engender friend- 
ships, or beget strength ? Did it ever shelter the cradle, or make 
the home safer, or strengthen home ties, or furnish ideals for 
youth or endurance for middle life, — or peace or comfort for 
old age ? Always it is the enemy of youth, — putting it in peril, 
setting traps for its unwary feet, digging pitfalls for it, forging 
chains for its limbs and reducing it to slavery. Always, it is 
the enemy of manhood, emptying it of strength, stripping it of 
ambition, digging graves for its ideals, robbing it of its glory 
and all chance for great achievement. Always, it is the enemy 
of old age, — making it abject and pitiful, stealing the roof 
from over its gray head, leaving it, at last, helpless, homeless 
and friendless. Sin cancels courage. It paralyzes mercy. It 
drugs the conscience. It denies the memory. It stupefies the 
reason. It narcotizes the judgment. It kills faith and hope 
and love. "What an arraignment ! Is it true ? It is true. No- 
body knows more certainly that it is true than those who have 
been defiled, despoiled, degraded, debauched and damned by 
it. It looks as if every sane man and woman in the world 
would join with the Lord of life in a supreme effort to drive 
this arch enemy of the souls of men back into the outer dark- 
ness out of which it came. 

If you want me to explain the fact of sin, perhaps, I cannot 
do better than to remind you of that chorus in the song of crea- 
tion, — "And God saw that it was good." Sin was no part of 
the original creation. Everything that came from the hand of 
God was good, but man, in the exercise of his sovereign power 
of choice, a royal prerogative, which while it puts him in peril, 
is also his crown and differentiates him from all lower animal 
life, — takes the good things of God and turns them into evil. 
In this way, he may turn liberty into license, prudence into 
prudery, caution into cowardice, industry into self-imposed 
slavery, generosity into extravagance, thrift into penurious- 
ness, truth-telling into insolent boorishness, mother-love into 
idolatry, — and the love of a man for a woman, which has in 



124 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

it .all altar pledges, all foundations for home, all fellowships 
of fireside, may, in this same way be turned into a lawless 
passion. Evil, perhaps, in the ultimate is the wrong use of good. 

This is seen in the use to which modern discoveries and in- 
ventions are being put on the battlefields of Europe. They 
are gifts of God to this age ; but to what base purposes they 
are being put. Dynamite to break up the granite heart of the 
cliff? To make irrigation ditches and so turn the desert into a 
garden? To tunnel the mountains and so promote trade and 
travel? To dig the Panama Canal and so emphasize the fact 
of the world's unity? To clear away the hills that cities may 
be built and sewers laid and homes erected for shelter of love ? 
It is the gift of God when used for these purposes. But it is 
being used, this gift of God, this thing that has in it something 
of the power of God, to blast and make bigger the mouth of 
hell, so that hate's choked heaps of dead may be got in. 

Man, in the exercise of his sovereign power, takes the good 
things of God and turns them into evil. He is himself respon- 
sible for this thing that puts his soul in peril. 

V. 

Because of sin, man needs a Savior. Salvation is the ultimate 
word of revelation. The Christian religion commends itself to 
thoughtful discerning men and women by its great words. 
There is the word ' 'faith." If you leave that word out of 
your vocabulary, you impoverish your speech and limit the 
language of the home and of social and commercial relations, as 
well as the language of religion. There is the word "hope," — 
that word with vision, with horizon, — a word of the hilltops. 
There is the word ' ' love, ' ' — a luminary among words, — a word 
that shines as if it were a chiseled piece of the sun. There is 
the word " obedience," — a word with a heart of oak, — an 
authoritative word, — one that is crowded to the girth limit 
with blessings for the home and for the state, as well as for the 
souls of men. There is the word "compassion," — a word that 
breathes pity as flowers do fragrance. There is the word 
"brotherly," crowded with silken cords and threads of gold 
and bonds of plaited fellowships. And there is the word "sal- 



CAREY ELMORE MORGAN 125 

vation." It is itself an evangel. It is a prophet word, big 
with the promise of life, — with a song in its syllables, — the 
prima donna of all singing words. One thing is to be remem- 
bered, — the Christian religion uses all the best words in human 
speech, with which to bring its message. 

It is impossible within the limits of this sermon to discuss 
the plan of salvation offered by our Lord. It is sufficient for 
our present purpose to recall the teaching of the Holy Book, 
which makes it plain that we can come to him by faith, repent- 
ance and obedience and that he saves us by his truth, by his 
life, by his death, by his love, and restores to us the divine 
image. 

This, then, is the teaching of the Bible, concerning men. He 
is the child of God. He is free born. He is responsible to God. 
Sin puts him in peril. But, in Christ Jesus, he may rind one 
who is mighty to save, who will make for him a way of escape 
and lead him back to God. 



EDGAR DeWITT JONES 

T^DGAR DeWITT JONES, as his name implies, is of Welsh stock, 
■*-- J and that means the best preacher stock to be found in all the world. 
This stock gives the necessary intellectual grasp of theological questions in 
union with a well-balanced heart power, without which preaching will always 
lack something in order to its highest efficiency. 

Edgar DeWitt Jones was born in Hearne, Texas, on Dec. 5, 1876, but 
his mother dying at his birth he was reared by his grandparents. The 
first nine years of his life were spent in the Muskingum Valley near Beverly, 
Ohio, and from 1886 his home was northeast Missouri. He was educated 
in the public schools of Missouri, a student at the State University in 1894 
and 1895; Western College, northeast Missouri, 1895-98; read law in office 
of Hon. E. A. Do well, La Belle, Mo.; left law for the Christian ministry; 
student at Kentucky University, 1898, 1899, 1900, 1901; minister at Er- 
langer, Kentucky, 1901-03; organized church there and led in building 
enterprise; minister at Franklin Circle Church, Cleveland, Ohio, 1903-06; 
First Church, Bloomington, Illinois, 1906, now in eleventh year with this 
congregation. 

As a preacher, Dr. Jones has won a deservedly high place. His steady 
and solid work with the Bloomington church has proved both his ability 
and faithfulness. His qualifications for making a successful pastor are 
excelled by very few, if by any, among Disciple preachers. By giving his 
best thoughts to his pulpit requirements, like the great preacher Alexander 
Maclaren, his sermons overflow with magnetic power, as well as logical con- 
sistency, both of which are necessary in preaching the glorious gospel of 
the grace of God. 

Dr. Jones personality is pleasing and his delightful social qualities 
make him a most agreeable companion and add much to his popularity 
among the people whom he serves. 

Dr. Jones has been a frequent speaker at chautauqua assemblies and in 
lecture courses. The degree of D.D. was conferred upon him in 1915 by 
Illinois Wesleyan University. Most of his literary work is of recent date 
and has been well received. He is the author of ' ' The Inner Circle, ' ' i ' The 
Middle Estate," "The Wisdom of God's Fools," and in the field of fiction, 
a story entitled, "Fairhope, the Annals of a Country Church." This work 
shows his fine literary culture and gives encouraging promise of success in 
his new field of labor. It is to be hoped that this divided interest of Dr. 
Jones will not swamp the pathway to the temple of fame. 



127 




Most fraternally yours, ^ 

e?^ %9tibl wvu, 



THE MINISTRY OF MEDIATION 

By Edgar DeWitt Jones 

Text. — ' ' Go thou near, and hear all that Jehovah our God shall 
say: and speak thou unto us all that Jehovah our God shall 
speak unto thee; and we will hear it, and do it." — Dent. 5 :27. 

THE scene is impressive. In the background is Monnt Sinai 
lurid with lightning, overhung with smoke, resonant with 
thunder. Below in the plain are gathered the Israelitish peo- 
ple, fearful, wondering. Up into the fastness of the mountain 
that might not be touched Moses makes his way and there he 
stands listening to the voice of God. On the one hand and 
afar off, the Israelitish host; on the other, the symbols of God's 
presence and between Israel and Jehovah is Moses the Mediator. 

A mediator, a "go-between," how old the idea, how peren- 
nially fresh the need. This idea of mediation and of mediator 
is woven all through the warp and woof of the Jewish religion 
and for that matter more or less through every religion. The 
Old Testament is full of it, the idea of priest and sacrifice, 
symbol and type of mediation is there ; and the idea is also in 
the New Testament and is part of the Christian faith. To a 
greater or lesser degree the idea of mediation is recognized by 
all Christian communions, embodied in liturgy, in hymnology, 
and forms of worship. In some churches the idea of media- 
tion is strongly stressed and the office of mediator clothed with 
special power and dignity. But quite apart from the formal 
and priestly office Christendom recognizes this truth of media- 
tion and applies it in countless ways. 

The Christian ministry, as conceived by all churches, has in 
it something of the mediatorial nature. Whether the minister 
be called ' ' pastor, " or ' ' priest, " or " preacher, " or " rector, ' ' or 
"missionary," or "evangelist," or "chaplain," he is a mediator 
and part of his work is mediation. As the Israelites said to 

129 



130 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Moses, so likewise a congregation of Christians say in effect 
to their minister — ' ' Go thou near, and hear all that the Lord our 
God shall say: and speak thou unto us all that the Lord our 
God shall speak unto thee ; and we will hear it, and do it. ' ' Not 
that the ministerial office, as we conceive it, has in and of 
itself any special approach to God that other Christians have 
not, but that it affords unique opportunities for study of the 
Holy Scriptures for reflection and communion with God. When 
a church selects a minister it is as though the membership 
representing various vocations should say to him: "We are a 
busy people, we are busy in home and in store and in shop; we 
believe in God, we wish to know more of his will, — "go thou 
near and hear what the Lord our God shall say, speak thou 
unto us all that the Lord shall speak unto thee, and we will hear 
and do it." 

On reflection it must impress us all as a wise provision that 
God has chosen as mediators human beings and so subject to 
all the vicissitudes to which mankind is heir. Moses, Israel's 
mediator, was very human. Chosen as he was and trained for 
his special work to lead Israel and to act as mediator between 
them and God, he was from among their people, blood of their 
blood and bone of their bone. And in that very fact, is one 
secret and power of his mediation. If angels preached the 
gospel to us doubtless their preaching would be better than 
man's, but the likelihood is that the appeal of the gospel as 
preached by angels would be less effective than when it comes 
by the lips of a fellow-mortal. A glorious company of angels 
proclaiming the word of God would be a splendid spectacle, 
but not nearly so persuasive as that same gospel preached by 
Paul battling with his thorn in his flesh, or Peter struggling 
with his impetuous nature, or John seeking to control the tem- 
pestuous temper that so beset him in his early days. 

Recently I read an article on "New Ideals of Church Lead- 
ership" in which the author said: "If the church is to have 
power it must have leaders who are specialists ; if it is to have 
an edifying pulpit, an efficient pastorate, a successful business 
management, and satisfactory music, it must have these de- 



EDGAR DeWITT JONES 131 

partments headed by specialists. Let one man with a gift for 
preaching be employed to do nothing else; let another with 
special qualifications for pastoral work visit the members ; let 
the finances of the church be shaped by specialists, and let the 
music director have charge of all the music of the congrega- 
tion." I am in sympathy with the spirit of the writer and in 
hearty agreement with some of his suggestions. I think I un- 
derstand, in part at least, the conditions that moved him to 
suggest such division of church leadership. It is true that no 
minister can preach with power who is worn mentally and 
physically by heavy detail and routine duties. The relieving 
him of such burdens is not only right but is absolutely neces- 
sary if the prophetic function of the pulpit be realized in mes- 
sages of power. Yet, I question the wisdom of appointing a 
man to preach and to do nothing else. Undoubtedly he might 
prepare fine and finished sermons and entertaining lectures, 
but I am not at all sure that he would be able to interpret the 
voice of God to his people. Moses went into the Holy Mount 
but he did not remain there, he returned again to the people, 
and he returned not merely to deliver his message but to mingle 
with them and help bear their burdens. Moses had numerous 
helpers but he bore the burden of his people's needs and that 
burden was often heavy on his heart. Therefore, his media- 
tion was the better, the stronger, the truer, I think. 

Once I listened to a great preacher in his own pulpit when 
he was as the Holy Spirit set to music. He was a fit vessel for 
the Master's use that morning; he had heard Jehovah and with 
winsome power he told us what he had heard. The sermon 
thrilled me through and through ; it made me feel that nothing 
is worth having save God in the soul. I heard this man again 
in his pulpit when he was worn and weary and his thought was 
rather commonplace. His personality was not magnetic as 
before. He preached with evident difficulty and the sermon 
was uphill work all the way through. I realized that the 
preacher was not at his best and perceived that he was mediat- 
ing God's word to the people under very great disadvantages, 
and that very fact drew the messenger to me by bonds of 



132 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

sympathy. I said to myself: "Here is a man carrying the bur- 
dens of a very large congregation; he has been listening to 
the story of loss and sorrow all week ; he has been overtaxed, 
the virtue has gone out of him. He is one with us in the great 
common experiences of life; he is mediating between us and 
God, as best he can, the word of Jehovah and to build us up in 
the faith that saves." 

I am not excusing dullness on a minister 's part ; on the con- 
trary, if that dullness be through indolence it is not excusable. 
A preacher who is dull and listless and commonplace because 
he is indolent is positively harmful. Such a man has no place 
in the pulpit. But Moses, mediating Jehovah to the children 
of Israel sometimes with breaking heart, sometimes weary in 
mind and body, is a figure at once majestic and potent. There 
is something beautiful, even helpful, in the spectacle of a Chris- 
tian minister who, like Moses, speaks for Jehovah, and like him, 
sometimes in stress and anxiety, mediates his message through 
a personality weighed down by ministrations in behalf of 
mankind. 

If I were a member of a congregation sitting in the pew 
Sunday after Sunday I would give the weight of my influence 
in behalf of the minister's release from much of the routine 
work of church management, but I would not want him to live 
apart overmuch from his people. I would not want him on 
the mount all the week coming down only on Sunday to preach. 
I would want him in the mount of silence and contemplation 
long enough to hear the voice of Jehovah; but I would want 
him, also, down on the plain with the people as was Moses in 
the long ago. No mediator can remain in the mount and medi- 
ate God's truth. Down below are the people who are needing 
to hear of what has taken place in the mountain fastness where 
face to face the mediator has communed with the Invisible. 
Robert Louis Stevenson's "Will o' the Mill" lived high up on 
a mountain side and watched the world go by. Below him 
the people came, went, below him men and women and children 
lived and loved and died. High up, almost amidst the clouds, 
"Will o' the Mill" lived and died. He communicated nothing 



EDGAR DeWITT JONES 133 

to the world, he was not a mediator, he lived and moved and 
had his being apart from the people, beyond them aloof and 
alone. The ministry of mediation requires contact and com- 
munion with God first and then contact and communion with 
God's children. 

"Go thou near and hear all that the Lord our God shall 
say." There is a fine art of hearing. "Take heed how ye 
hear" is one of Jesus' warnings. For myself, I confess a dif- 
ficulty in hearing; the subtle temptation which besets me is 
to hear a little and talk a great deal. One of the ever-present 
perils of a preacher is that he become a parrot, that he wax 
voluble, and his message grow wordy rather than weighty. It 
is a great privilege to be a "voice" — John the Baptist was a 
voice and he was a prophet. It is easier to become a "mouth," 
to be a word-monger, instead of a word-mediator. 

"Go thou near and hear all that the Lord our God shall 
say." This privilege belongs not only to the minister, but to 
every Christian. All that has been affirmed in this study with 
reference to the ministry is true also of the laity. Theoretically, 
most of us believe, in the mediatorship of every believer. Prac- 
tically, we ignore it. In Sunday school or prayer meeting talk 
we are sure that Christ has commissioned every believer to go 
and make other disciples. In the hurly-burly of everyday life 
we act as though we bore no such high commission. The New 
Testament, and particularly the Hebrew Epistle, teaches the 
priesthood of every Christian. To be a priest under the old 
Jewish order was a very great honor; an honor and a dignity 
which in the old order could belong to only a few, may under 
the new be bestowed upon the humblest follower of Christ. If 
every Christian is a priest then two things follow: First, he 
has the priestly prerogative which is the right to go to God 
without hindrance. Our word for this priceless privilege is 
the short and simple term "prayer;" prayer for one's self, 
prayer for others. When the high priest came into the holy of 
holies he wore a breast-plate over his heart and on that breast- 
plate the name of every tribe was engraved. Face to face with 
God he interceded for all. There is something altogether beau- 
tiful in this ministry of prayer for others; and there is some- 



134 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

thing significant and illuminating in that Old Testament inci- 
dent of Samuel and Saul where Samuel, the Judge, steps down 
and out of his office to give place to the king, and informs Saul 
that he will not cease to pray for him, saying "Far be it from 
me that I should sin against Jehovah in ceasing to pray for 
thee." Second, if every Christian is a priest then the priestly 
function is his, and that is to offer sacrifice. Not the burnt 
offerings as under the old Jewish order, but sacrificial ministry 
of a life dedicated to God through Christ. The apostle Paul, 
in Romans 12:1, sums up the matter superbly: "I beseech you, 
therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God to present your 
bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your 
spiritual service." And in the Hebrew Epistle 13:15, the 
idea is finely expressed: "Through him then let us offer up a 
sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of lips 
which make confession to his name. But to do good and to 
communicate forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well 
pleased." 

Truly, we are called to be mediators of the new covenant 
and higher calling than this there is not in all the world. Yet, 
even so, our human mediations, at their best leave something to 
be desired, they are incomplete, they are partial and not alto- 
gether successful. The frailties of human nature make the 
mediation of human beings imperfect. The mediatorship of 
Moses was not perfect. And this brings us to the recognition 
of that universal yearning of humanity for a mediator between 
God and man that shall be complete, lacking in nothing, per- 
fect. God seems so far distant, so awful, so almighty; man so 
small, so futile, so feeble. Who, or what, shall bridge the great 
gulf? Job sets forth this longing of mankind eloquently when 
out of his deep distress he cries: 

"God is not a man that I should answer him, 
There is no daysman betwixt us 
That might lay his hand upon us both. 
Then would I speak and not fear him." 

This is the cry of all humanity, and this great cry God has 
answered in Jesus Christ. Christ fulfills every longing of the 



EDGAR DeWITT JONES 135 

human heart, he is the "daysman/' or "umpire" for whom 
Job longed, he is betwixt us and the Father, and he lays, 
so to speak, one understanding hand upon the Father and one 
understanding hand upon us. He is the answer to Philip's 
pathetic plaint: "Show us the Father, and it sufficeth us." A 
wonderful reach, this Mediator has; he reaches through the 
vast spaces and lays hold upon God ; he reaches down into the 
vast depth to the fartherest fallen humanity. His humanity 
commends him to us, he was of us and is one with us, and he 
is of God and one with God. All the mediators between God 
and man, all the great line of prophets were conscious of limi- 
tations, were sensible of sin; but here is one unbroken by sin 
and having his being in closest fellowship with the Father, one 
whose mediation is without flaw. 

The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews has appraised this 
mediator aright, has set him before us at once as the highest 
and lowliest. In Scripture that ought to be memorized by 
every follower of the Lord Christ, the author of the Epistle to 
the Hebrews writes : ' ' We have not a high priest who cannot be 
touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but one that hath 
been in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let 
us, therefore, draw near with boldness unto the throne of grace 
that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help us in 
time of need." 

Speaking by and large, the Scriptures record on the one 
hand the ascent of man, and on the other hand the descent of 
God. That is to say, the scriptural narratives show man 
reaching out after God ' ' if haply they might feel after him and 
find him," to use Paul's meaningful phrase in his speech on 
Mar's Hill. And, the Scriptures also show God's descent. 
Jesus said, "I am come down out of heaven;" and so it comes 
to pass that God's reaching out to man, and man's reaching 
out after God — that these two endeavors meet in Jesus Christ. 
A mediation Godward and manward, satisfactory, sustaining, 
incomparable. Whatever theology one may have of the work 
and office of Jesus Christ, every sincere student of his life must 
concede this mediatorial ministry of the Nazarene. The world 



136 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

has never been the same since Jesus came; life has never been 
precisely as it was before; death has lost somewhat its dark- 
ness and its tragedy. The Old Testament looks forward to a 
better mediator than Moses. The types and figures and shadows 
of the old Jewish system are fulfilled and given substance in 
the life and ministry of our Lord. 

Alongside of the Old Testament books of Exodus and Deuter- 
onomy, the Epistle to the Hebrews should be ranged and com- 
pared. The Epistle to the Hebrews has one great theme and 
one alone and that is to show the superiority of Christianity 
over Judaism, of Christ over Moses. If the account of Moses 
at Mount Sinai, mediating between God and Israel, is impres- 
sive, the record of the mediation of the New Covenant is 
surpassingly beautiful. Alongside of Exodus, the nineteenth 
and twentieth chapters and Deuteronomy, the fourth and fifth 
chapters, with their terrifying descriptions of Sinai and the 
awestruck Israelitish hosts, should be placed the twelfth chap- 
ter of Hebrews and that ineffable description of the new media- 
tion accomplished with beauty and grace in Jesus Christ. 
"For ye are not come unto a mount that might be touched, and 
that burned with fire, and unto blackness, and darkness, and 
tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words; 
which voice they that heard entreated that no word more 
should be spoken unto them; for they could not endure that 
which was enjoined, If even a beast touch the mountain, it 
shall be stoned ; and so fearful was the appearance, that Moses 
said, I exceedingly fear and quake: but ye are come unto 
Mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly 
Jerusalem, and to innumerable hosts of angels, to the general 
assembly and church of the firstborn who are enrolled in 
heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of just 
men made perfect, and to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, 
and to the blood of sprinkling that speaketh better than that 
of Abel." 

I have read lately Henry Sienkiewicz 's little booklet enti- 
tled "Let us Follow Him." I like much that title! "Let us 
Follow Him," for to follow Him is to go near, yea, very near, 



EDGAR DeWITT JONES 137 

to the Lord our God; to venture unafraid into the vasty deeps 
of the Spirit, to follow Him is to hear a voice speaking like 
the Voice of Many Waters; to follow Him is to come down 
from the mountain and from out of the silence into the very 
midst of the noisy multitude; to follow Him is to minister to 
men and women storm-tossed, sin-smitten, terribly-tempted, 
and all but undone; to follow Him is to mediate God's forgive- 
ness and restoration to the Father's house of many mansions. 
Oh Christ, thou Great Mediator, thou who art- one with the 
Father and one with us also, "Go thou near and hear all that 
Jehovah our God shall say and speak thou unto us all that 
Jehovah our God shall speak unto thee, and we shall hear and 
do it." 



HUGH McLELLAN 

r "PHE subject of this sketch is first of all and mainly a preacher of the 
•*■ Gospel. It is doubtful whether there is another representative in this 
volume, who has kept closer to his special calling than has Mr. McLellan. 
The pulpit has been his chosen field of work, and he has refused to neglect 
this for any other service. 

The outstanding facts of his life are easily summed up : 

Born Glasgow, Scotland. Lived in Melbourne, Australia. Came to the 
United States in 1890, and matriculated in Transylvania University, Lex- 
ington, Ky. Graduated in 1895 in College of Bible, and in Arts College 
with A.B. degree. Graduated 1896 A.M. degree, Transylvania. Minister at 
Shelbyville, Ky., six years; at Eichmond, Ky., ten years; at San Antonio, 
Texas, seven years and continuing. 

In this brief record is contained the sphere where has been developed one 
of the best equipped preachers to be found among the Disciples. This equip- 
ment relates to both his pulpit work and his pastoral work. There is a 
certain refinement about his sermons which shows they are born out of as- 
sociation with the best reading and reflection, and this culture is marked in 
all his relations to his people. 

While President of the American Christian Missionary Society, he made 
one of the most notable and polished addresses ever delivered from the 
presidential chair. 

As a preacher he possesses the indefinable quality which lays hold of one 
without knowing how the influence is produced. There is something in his 
voice and in his general elocution as well as in his thought that grips you. 
If one has been under the influence of a great musician he will understand 
what this means. But Mr. McLellan is more than a musician. He is a 
remarkable combination of intellectual force and heart power. 

There is also in his preaching a beautiful blending of a fine literary taste 
with the rugged truths of the Gospel. He says the strong things of the 
Bible, but he tempers them with the fascination of culture and while doing 
this he never dilutes the Gospel or robs it in any way of its wonderful 
power. He is a preacher who will always grow through the years of a long 
pastorate and will be beloved to the end. 



139 




v^/ "l ^k^ 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE CONDI- 
TIONS OF SALVATION 

By Hugh McLellan 

A UNITARIAN minister of this city advertised in the daily 
press that he wanted people to come to his services, "not 
to get saved, but to get manhood." This is a good example of 
distinction without difference. It is not surprising, though, 
that he thought manhood to be one thing and salvation another, 
and a very different thing. Nor is he much to be blamed; for 
the ordinary presentation of salvation in sermons, hymns, and 
illustrations, makes salvation an arbitrary thing wholly out- 
side the man. 

It is well at the outset, to get a clear idea of what salvation 
really is. To do this it is well to state some things that salva- 
tion is not. Salvation is not "going to heaven when you die." 
It is not an escape from hell. It is not an evasion of the grave. 
It is not a rope let down from heaven to pull the sinner up into 
glory. It is not even the "Old Ship of Zion" on which one 
takes passage for the harbor of eternal rest. It is not a sensa- 
tion of calm and peace, or a sense of pardon. Salvation is more 
than these. Now it is true that a saved man will go to heaven 
when he dies, and will escape death and hell, and will have 
peace and a sense of pardon, but salvation is more than these. 
These things are but the results and signs of a man's salvation. 
We get a hint of the nature of salvation early in the gospels. 
Before the Savior was born the angel announced, "thou shalt 
call his name Jesus, because he shall save his people from their 
sins." Not save them in their sins, but save them from their 
sins. A man that is saved from his sins is saved from death and 
hell. He is on the Old Ship of Zion and the end of the voyage 
is clear. He has peace and pardon and victory because he is 
saved. When the man is saved from his sins, his manhood will 
look after itself. 

141 



142 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Sin is the arch enemy of the soul. It robbed us of our Eden. 
It separated us from God, the source of life and joy. Salva- 
tion can come to us only as we destroy this enemy of humanity. 
Sin is a disease in the body of life, and unless it be expelled 
the life will perish. Sin is a fire which is burning down the 
house, unless the fire is put out the house will be consumed. 
Sin is a path, a course, a way of life, and if a man walk in that 
way to the end he will surely perish. The wages of sin is death. 
Sin is a spiritual degeneration in which the nature of man 
becomes brutish, dropping lower and lower. How strange it is 
that the course of sin is always conceived as a descent. The idea 
of ' ' going down ' ' is inseparable from sin. Not . only in the 
Bible but in all literature the mind recognizes the descent. We 
speak of a man "going down." We allude to the "low life." 
The idea is in "fallen woman," "steeped in crime," "sunk in 
sin, " " down in the gutter, " " going down hill, " " depravity. ' ' 
The guilty look is a downward look. "His ghost sits heavy on 
my soul." Jesus speaks of men having millstones hung about 
their necks and cast into the depths of the sea. The "burden" 
of sin, and the "weight" of guilt. The bottomless pit is more 
than a Bible creation. It is a profound truth recognized in all 
literature. It is true not because the Almighty made a pit, but 
because sin, in its working, is the dropping of the soul lower 
and lower in the process of spiritual degeneration. And this 
would be so were there no God and no Bible and no Cross. 
Apart from all theology, sin, because it is sin, and because of 
its relation to human nature is ever death. The reality of the 
bottomless pit is in the consciousness of every man. Our feet 
skirt its brink. A timid theology may try to palliate or deny, 
but this is not dependent on theology, new or old. Gravity 
exists whether there is a science of mathematics to explain it 
or not. 

It was indeed the gospel, the veritable good news of God, 
that Jesus would save his people from their sins. No wonder 
the angels sang. They knew. Humanity has not reached the 
singing stage yet. In the process of recuperation we are at the 
point of the wan and sickly smile. Some day we shall know 



HUGH McLELLAN 143 

from what we have been delivered and then we shall sing. 
That Jesus saves from sin and death is so wonderful, that it is 
nothing short of glad tidings of great joy. The highest title of 
Jesus is the neglected title of Savior. It is this title which 
gives us the key to the whole problem of salvation from sin. 
It is salvation by a Savior. Not by a system or a plan, but by 
a person. The great misconception as to the conditions of sal- 
vation, has been the regarding them as parts of a saving scheme. 
Cogs in the wheel of redemption, with something of virtue in 
themselves. Thus have these spiritual conditions, disassoci- 
ated from the Savior, been degraded into mechanical, arbitrary 
and legalistic steps. 

The " conditions of salvation" are Faith, Repentance and 
Baptism. As we well know, they are called conditions of sal- 
vation because salvation is conditioned on them. Two pas- 
sages of Scripture will be enough to fix their conditional place: 
"Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved;" 
"Repent and be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus 
Christ for the remission of your sins." Now, if salvation be 
salvation from sin, and if salvation come to us through a Savior, 
how are faith, repentance, and baptism related to the cure of 
sin and to the personal Savior of men? 

1. Faith. It will be noticed in the Scriptures that faith as a 
saving condition is not mere faith, or faith in irrelevant 
things. It is faith in Christ. By faith is meant the appropria- 
tion of Christ into one's life and love. It does not make the 
meaning of faith any clearer to give it another name as belief 
or trust. A good way to find out what faith in Christ is, is to 
note its action in a life. Paul, at one time, did not believe in 
the Christ. After a time, and after such kicking against the 
goads, he believed in Christ with all his soul and strength. It 
made a great change in the man. No longer does he seek his 
own desires, but the desires of Christ. Christ's will becomes 
his law. The Christ life is his consuming ambition. He de- 
nies self, suffers shame and persecution and rejoices that in 
this he is joined to Christ. He thinks the thoughts of Jesus. 
His body is the marked and branded slave of his Lord. The 



144 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

climax is reached when Paul says, "I live, yet not I, Christ 
liveth in me." Evidently in the case of Paul, faith in Christ 
vras Christ possession. It is clear that a life possessed by Christ 
is saved from sin, for if Christ fills it sin can find no room there. 
To the extent that sin is found, to that extent does a life lack 
Christ possession. Faith in Christ operates in the life very 
much as an antitoxin acts in a diseased body. Take diphtheria, 
for example. "When the diphtheretic membrane is spreading 
over the air passages, it is evident that the disease is overcom- 
ing the body and that death will speedily ensue. The physi- 
cian injects an antitoxin serum. The action of this is to rally 
the fighting power of the blood to overcome the disease. A 
battle royal begins in which the serum fights the poison, and 
the healthy blood corpuscles fight the diseased ones. One or 
the other must gain the victory. There can be no truce, for life 
and death know no compromise. They cannot exist in the same 
place together. In the same way when, by faith, Christ enters 
a life, the standard of revolt is raised against sin. Christ and sin 
cannot exist in the same soul at the same time. No man can sin 
and believe in Christ at the same time. When a man sins he is 
not believing in Christ at that moment. He is believing in 
something else. A man sins only when he turns his eyes away 
from Christ. It is in this sense that faith in Christ is a condi- 
tion of salvation, for as long as Christ abides in the heart the 
victory over sin is drawing nearer. "And ye know that He 
was manifested to take away our sins; and in Him is no sin. 
Whosoever abideth in Him sinneth not: whosoever sinneth hath 
not seen Him, neither know Him." "Thou shalt call his 
name Jesus, because he shall save his people from their sins." 
2. Repentance. In considering repentance as a condition of 
salvation, an objection naturally arises in the mind, and we 
ask, if a man be saved by faith in Christ, is he saved again in 
repentance ? Is it another salvation ? It is not surprising that 
this question should arise, for the old illustrations of the con- 
ditions of salvation as three "steps," and three "links" and 
three "provisions in a contract," etc., in a word, the old dia- 
gram method, has caused many to think that the conditions of 



HUGH McLELLAN 145 

salvation were different principles. Not so. They are one and 
the same. Repentance is but the visible operation of faith in a 
life. It is the work of faith as seen from the outside. To 
revert to our illustration of the antitoxin, when the serum 
asserts its power and the victory swings to the side of life, the 
deadly membrane in the throat begins to come away. It is 
sloughed off. The sloughing off of the dead tissue is only a sign 
seen from without of the victory of the life within. So when 
Christ enters the life through faith, sin is sloughed off and the 
dead works come away. This can be seen on the outside. "We 
give the process a name as " repentance," or "reformation," 
or "turning," but the secret of the reformation is the indwell- 
ing Christ. The simplicity and beauty of the power of Christ 
in a life has been obscured by the vicious habit of dividing the 
process into stages and giving these stages names. This has 
made many blackboard sermons and doctrinal diagrams. It is 
doubtful if the work of the Holy Spirit can be diagramed. The 
beauty of repentance has been marred at this point. The 
philologist with his derivations, and the legalist with his charts 
and diagrams have done much to divorce faith and repentance. 
What God hath joined together let not man put asunder. Nico- 
demus may want a diagram as to how these things can be ; but 
when a man can diagram the wind which bloweth where it 
listeth, then might he venture into the realm of the Spirit. 
The tree manifests itself in bark, and twig and flowing sap and 
falling leaf; but the life is one, and the tree is one. The life 
which stirs the sap and unfolds the bud is the same life which 
pushes off the falling leaf. The life is one. The Christ life in 
us will surely unfold many a grace to the sun, but surely also 
will it push off the dead leaves. This falling of the dead habits, 
dead works, dead leaves, is repentance. The life of the tree 
is one. 

3. Baptism. In approaching a consideration of baptism as a 
condition of salvation, we at once feel the peculiar place this 
ordinance has in the mind of Christendom. Faith and repent- 
ance have good standing and full fellowship as conditions of 
salvation among all Christians but baptism with many, is either 



146 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

an outcast or an interloper. Around baptism have flared the 
fires of debate. It has been depreciated, scorned, and ridi- 
culed. The best that some can say for it is, that it is an 
annoying survival from Judaism; while others, having no 
particular use for it themselves, have relegated it to the ignoble 
office of naming unbelieving infants. 

Were it not for very clear passages of Scripture we might 
be intimidated, and forced to admit that baptism had no place 
in the saving of a sinner. To fortify the mind and heart, let us 
recall some Scriptures. ''Go ye therefore and teach all nations, 
baptizing them into the name of the Father, Son and Holy 
Spirit. " "Repent and be baptized everyone of you in the name 
of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins." "Arise and be 
baptized and wash away thy sins, calling on the name of the 
Lord." In a general way we would suppose that Jesus and 
his apostles would not command so frequently and at such 
critical points in conversion, an act which had no spiritual 
value. In a particular way, we see that in nearly every instance 
baptism stands related to the remission of sins. As remission 
of sins, death to sin, is the very heart of salvation, and is the 
peculiar work of the indwelling Christ, how is baptism related 
to this remission and this indwelling Savior? If baptism be a 
condition of salvation, it must be connected with the indwelling 
Christ and the dying sin. There is a decided presumption in 
favor of such a connection in the words of Paul when he says, 
"For as many of you as were baptized into Christ, have put on 
Christ." Here baptism is clearly co-ordinate and synonymous 
with the acceptance of Christ. Paul places baptism in the 
same spiritual plane as faith and repentance. He could not 
use such language of an ordinance which had no spiritual 
value. But this apostle goes deeper into the matter in his let- 
ter to the Romans. He says, "How shall we that are dead to 
sin live any longer therein?" Who then are these saved ones 
who are dead to sin? Paul answers, "Know ye not that so 
many of us as were baptized into Christ were Baptized into his 
death." "Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into 
death." Here the teaching of the apostle is that baptism func- 



HUGH McLELLAN 147 

tions two ways in the salvation of the sinner. First, it is a 
death to sin. Second, it is a union with Christ in his 
death. It does not dispose of this spiritual conception to say, 
"all that is figurative." There is in baptism a figure, and 
there is a fact. 

The figure in baptism is the figure or symbol of death. Some 
have been so anxious to show the burial in baptism that they 
have overlooked the point that it is a burial "into death." 
When the sinner has been put under the water, and for a mo- 
ment is shut off from air and light and sound, the avenues of 
life are closed. Life in that moment is suspended. The condi- 
tions are the conditions of death. Were he kept there for five 
minutes the figure would become a fact. When he is raised 
from the water, the apostle says he is raised to walk " in a new 
life." Baptism is the hiatus between the old life and the new. 
The old life died and the new life sprang into being. Such is 
the figure, a figure of death. 

The fact of baptism is that in that act the believer touches 
the Lord in the Lord's death. "As many of us as were bap- 
tized into Christ were baptized into his death." The death of 
Christ was two thousand years ago, and the green hill is far 
away; but God is great and is able to link the believing heart to 
the Crucified One. "Faith leaps the stream of time in loving 
him. ' ' Nicodemus may say, ' ' How can these things be ? " Some 
light is shed on this by the parallel ordinance of the Lord's 
Supper. The figure in the Feast also is a figure of death. It is 
a communion of his broken body and shed blood. Is this com- 
munion with Christ in his death a real communion or is it only 
and purely figurative? Is it a dead play, or may the believer 
through the medium of bread and wine, touch the Crucified? 
Many, perhaps most Christians, believe that the communion 
with the living Christ is real, and by faith they have been 
brought to the Cross. To avoid the mere dead figure, Romanism 
has invented a barbarous miracle in transubstantiation. They 
think it better to reproduce the very flesh and blood rather 
than miss the reality of his death. There is no need for the 
heathen miracle. Through faith we may have a real fellowship 



148 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

with Christ in his death. But if faith through the medium of 
bread may touch the Lord in his death, why may not faith do 
so through the medium of water? What virtue does the wine 
possess over the baptismal water ? If the Lord has put a spirit- 
ual import into the bread of communion, can he not do as much 
in water of baptism ? The water and the wine and the bread all 
lie in the same dead material plane. Only through faith is any 
one of them a medium of communion. What faith may do 
through one, faith may do through all. If God can make the 
table a meeting place with the Christ in his sufferings, why 
should it be thought a thing incredible that God can make the 
baptismal water a meeting place with him in his death. 

It is this linking of the act of baptism with Christ which 
makes it an act of faith and explains its relation to remission 
of sins. We are saved by a Savior. We accept him through 
faith. We give him larger room by the displacement of sin in 
repentance. We die to sin in baptism and come into contact 
with his atoning blood. "And if we be dead with him, we 
shall also live with him." 

In conclusion, this view of the conditions of salvation is 
open to the charge of mysticism. That may be. However, it 
does not disprove a position to give it a name. Less than a 
spiritual conception of these conditions is legalism. The mystic 
is always in good company. The man who wrote the thirteenth 
chapter of First Corinthians was no legalist. No legalist could 
say, "I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." No legalist 
was ever caught into a third heaven. As a people we are not 
suffering from mysticism. The poor benighted Romanist turns 
the Bread into flesh, if so be he might touch his Lord. The 
mystic Suso was found dead in his cell. When they opened 
his hair shirt, they found deeply cut into his breast the name, 
Jesus. It was a barbarous deed, but a divine desire. It was the 
struggle of a soul to be one with Christ. 

"The world is too much with us; late and soon, 
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers; 
Little we see in Nature that is ours; 
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon! 



HUGH McLELLAN 149 

The sea that bares her bosom to the moon ; 
The winds that will be howling at all hours; 
And are upgathered now like sleeping flowers; 
For this, for everything, we are out of tune; 
It moves us not. — Great God! I'd rather be 
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn; 
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea, 
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn; 
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea; 
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn." 



GEORGE HAMILTON COMBS 

WHEN I wrote to Dr. Combs for some facts about himself as basis for 
a short sketch, he sent a most unique and entertaining account. Some 
of the humorous references are so characteristic of the man that a repro- 
duction of them in their proper places will illustrate the real George Combs 
better than anything I could say. 

"Was born July 27, 1864. Parents Wm. Pryor and Elizabeth Frances 
Combs. Place, Campbellsburg, Ky. Of English and Irish stock. Great- 
grandfather Hamilton Wilson, an elder and charter member of old Cane 
Ridge church. Dec. 23, 1885, married Martha Miller Stapp, daughter of 
Educator Dr. John S. Stapp, and granddaughter of Eobert Augustus Broad- 
hurst, Pres. Midway Orphan School. Three children — boys. 

"Educated at Fairmount College, Home College, Kentucky University. 
Received Ph.D. degree from Wooster University, 1887. LL.D. degree from 
Drake University, 1897. 

"First pastorate of five years at Shelbyville, Ky. Came to Kansas City, 
January 1, 1893. Just celebrated 24th anniversary of pastorate. The 
church building, furnishings, organ, etc., cost about $300,000.00. Book 
membership, 3,100. 

' ' Have nibbled at a bit of outside ministry, chief est of which are college 
and university addresses by the hundreds. Convention addresses and series 
of lectures to preachers." 

As a preacher, he says: "I am likened to Henry Van Dyke, F. W. 
Robertson and Billy Sunday, and am really like nobody else, for which the 
other fellow may be duly grateful." Think of the three men referred to 
dwelling together in one man! But the description is not inappropriate, 
though it may seem an impossible combination. Dr. Combs possesses much 
of Van Dyke's beautiful spirit and fondness for exquisite imagery; while 
his broad yet healthful vision of the religion of Jesus Christ may constantly 
remind one of the freedom and original treatment everywhere manifest in 
the sermons of the peerless Robertson; and then in Dr. Combs, like Billy 
Sunday, all these things are on fire, and so much so as to make us forget 
all rules of elocution and think only of the burning message which the 
speaker is delivering. 

Dr. Combs' personality does not specially contribute to the interest of 
his sermons, and yet paradoxical as it may seem, it is mainly his personality 
that helps to hold the attention of his great audience. He says, "I weigh 
125 pounds when I am fat; am as ugly as sin; my redeeming trait is — not 
snoring. ' ' 

Though he gives his first thought to his pulpit he has found time to write 

151 



152 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

a few books of considerable literary excellence, viz., "The New Socialism," 
"Christ in Modern English Literature," "Some Latter-Day Religions," 
"The Call of the Mountains." Of these books he says: "Few people read 
them." 

Bait Dr. Combs need not worry about his books. He is emphatically a 
preacher. He who speaks to thousands every Lord's Day occupies the grand- 
est position for effecting immediate good that can be found in the whole 
round of human experience. 

The conclusion of his letter to me is most delightful in its want of self- 
admiration. He says: "Have done little to chronicle. Eead widely 
but not profoundly. Know a little about a great many things and not much 
about anything. Am called a scholar and know myself an ignoramus. Am 
glad in that I have never kow-towed either to the rich or the poor. Have 
never asked counsel of any man as to what I should preach, seeing that 
I have my commission from heaven. I try to keep the windows open out, 
do not believe the ten commandments are in need of daily revision. My 
faith doesn't spread over much territory but it goes deep. And — well, why 
should I be telling further about myself? Everybody has been good and 
gracious to me all my life and I have always received of appreciation and 
love far, far beyond my deserving." 

Dr. Combs is childlike in his spirit, gentle, tender, and remarkably 
sympathetic, but when aroused, he is a flame of fire, a sort of personal 
tornado, and like John, though leaning on the Master's breast, a real 
"son of thunder." His preaching exhausts the whole gamut of human 
speech. Sometimes his voice sobs along the lowest notes, and melts the 
heart that listens, sometimes it trills through the highest ranges, and makes 
the very nerves tingle with delight as the music trips over the mountain 
peaks of the highlands of melody; and then again the lightning's flash, 
and the thunder's roar, until the storm of feeling has run its course, and 
the audience is suddenly landed in a safe place where the cold conclusions 
of logic have irresistible sway, and bring conviction to the waiting soul. 
Dr. Combs has all the colore of the rainbow in his preaching, but when 
these colors are blended, they make the white light of the Gospel message 
which, is the power of Cod unto salvation to all who believe. 

But no one can adequately describe Dr. Combs as a preacher. He is in 
a class by himself, and in some respects there is no simile that can be used 
to help draw a correct picture of his preaching. One must hear him sev- 
eral times to get a clear conception of the secret of his power. 

As an evidence of how his church appreciates him, he has recently been 
given a year's vacation, for travel and recreation, so as to build up his 
health. 






vr (c/l^^sC 



THE RETURN TO FAITH 

By Geo. H. Combs 

Text. — " And the ransomed of Jehovah shall return and come 
with singing into Zion." — Isa. 51:11. 

RETUKN? Why not go forward? Is not evolution the 
sounding watchword? Is not progress the hope of the 
centuries and the hours? Why go back? 

"Forward, forward, let us range 
Let the great world spin forever down the ringing grooves of Change.' ' 

Do not "new occasions teach new duties?" Does not time 
make ancient good uncouth? Then why return? 

Now granting that the law of development is sovereign and 
that the urge of progress should be felt by all it yet remains 
true that ofttimes development moves over the track of the 
yesterdays and that we but go forward by going back. 

Let us recognize at the outset that progress is the label of 
the tentative, the imperfect, the half truth. Progress is only 
in the tones of the experimental. To say that we must always 
go on is to say that there is no definite goal for life or endeavor. 

Evolution is a road but surely it must lead somewhere. 

There is no progress in truth. Her mansions rest on fixed 
foundations. Truth is never on a pilgrimage. When we touch 
truth we touch the moveless. Mathematical truths know no 
change. The axiom: The straight line is the shortest distance 
between two points, is incapable of revision. Physical truths 
wear ever the same faces. 

Neither is there place for progress in the realms of moral and 
spiritual. The Ten Commandments will not budge. Sinai has 
granite bases. When once the truth of anything is glimpsed 
then progress has come to the end of her ways. For the truth 

153 



154 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

abides in perfect fixity. Progress then can only obtain in an 
ever deepening loyalty to the thing disclosed. 

Progress, I have said, is the badge of the imperfect. When 
once we have come to do anything as it should be done there is 
no further advance. 

There is a right way, the best way, to do anything and once 
having found that way departures are ever declensions. 

This boasted progress has, after all, rather a short tether, for 
it can never adventure into the kingdoms of truth or perfection. 
And neither can it enter the universe of principle. The great 
ultimates have closed doors. Take the oughts — can there be 
progress here? Right, wrong — are not these clear outside the 
pale of progress? You cannot alter right; you cannot put a 
saint's face on the dead wrong. Right, wrong — they are fur- 
ther beyond the reach of change than the inaccessible stars. 

The call then to forward ranging is the thin cry only to ad- 
ventures in the dark. They are worthwhile adventures to be 
sure and with the inspiration of the imperative, but theirs is 
no call from the deeps. 

But if anywhere along the track of the years there has ever 
been revealed the perfect, the true, the right then there is a 
call from the skies to return to that place of holy unveiling. 

And this is our stout contention — that this revelation has 
been given. Sinai has been revealed, the Mount of the Beati- 
tudes has been revealed ; the eternal principles of life and con- 
duct have been revealed. We should go back to their rapt con- 
templation. 

Furthermore there is justification in a "return" if we have 
lost anything on the way. If you lose, no matter what, precious 
stones or priceless spectacles, the only way to find them is to go 
back to the place where they were lost. 

Now the world has lost something. Emerson somewhere 
sings, 

"One accent of the Holy Ghost 
The heedless world has never lost. " 

but it is a shallow song. For the world has been ever losing 
things. It has lost "arts." Read the fascinating lecture of 



GEORGE HAMILTON COMBS 155 

Wendell Phillips on the "Lost Arts" to discover the lengths 
of the misfortune. It has lost "chords." It has lost truths. 
It has lost life. Let it go back then and find what it has lost. 
And so it will return in search of purity. The man has lost 
his whiteness of soul. He has gained many things, many 
prizes — wealth, place, splendid accomplishments — but he has 
lost the clearness of his baby eyes. 

"Backward, roll backward, O Time in your flight, 
Make me a child again, just for tonight ! ' ' 

Why? Chiefly, I think, because of the recognition that along 
with our many gains there is that tragical loss of the once 
unbrushed bloom of the soul and we want it back. 

As with the individual so with institutions, purity is in the 
great beginnings. We glory in our democracy and we do well 
to glory in it, but democracy is as the great Mississippi, broad, 
wide-sweeping as it nears the gulf, but following with the 
stains of its many wandering miles and pure only when it is- 
sues as crystal stream from the cleft mountain side. 

And in like case is Christianity. Like the mountains brook, 
pure in its beginning, yet contaminated by the thousand ad- 
mixtures in its nineteen-century flow. To find a pure Chris- 
tianity we must go back. 

It will return in search of idealism. Again we may take a les- 
son from the State. The great American idealists are found in 
our beginning days. In these hundred years of republican ex- 
perimentation we have hit upon many practical ways of doing 
things, but we have lost our dreams. What dreams the fathers 
had ! What dreams of equality, of a new political renaissance, 
of a new-found asylum for all the down-trodden ones of earth, 
of a democracy that should be bread and milk and mother arms 
to all the world ! And the dreamers and the dreams are dead ! 
Well do we, therefore, to evoke the spirits of the patriots who 
sleep to rouse us to a return to the beautiful ideals that thralled 
their burning hearts. 

And it is so with the Church. We have machinery in plenty — 
God, how much machinery we have — and the din of it is 



156 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

ever in our ears, but the dear dreams have gone. Let us 
return. 

Then, too, we have lost our faith. There is no use to deny it, 
we have. The forms of faith are with us, but the spirit has 
fled. We retain the labels, the phrases, the catchwords, but 
men and women, how many of us in our hearts really, deeply 
believe the things we say? I do not mean that we disbelieve; 
I only mean that we have not summoned our energies to the 
creation of a heroic faith. Do you really believe the words the 
preacher read this morning from God's book? Do you really 
believe that the prayer went anywhere ? Do you really believe 
the words he is speaking now? 

Ah, you say you believe; you say you would die for your 
religion, but do you? would you? Mayhap I have spoken too 
harshly, too sweepingly, yet — and yet, I tremble lest we have 
all lost our faith. Let us go back. Let us recreate the whole 
story of the Blessed Life among men. Let us leap the gulf of all 
these dividing years and have one fresh glimpse of the face of 
our Lord. Let us seek from him the thing we crave, crying 
chokingly, "I believe, help thou mine unbelief." 

With faith we have also lost our passion. Even though we 
may have a kind of faith it is not a molten faith. There is no 
flame-scorch about it. We are not consumed. At best our faith 
is but a smileless wave when it should be a love flood. We are 
swept by no rocking gales of passion. We do not shout any 
more. We do not cry any more. Everywhere there is the placid- 
ity of perfect restraint. We preachers never "break down" in 
the pulpit. We are too well mannered for that. We are afraid 
that we shall be dubbed "enthusiasts" and we peddle out our 
little manicured essays when we should be seizing trumpets and 
blowing battles into men. What a fall from the burning moun- 
tains of the Apostolic Church ! What a divine passion swayed 
those first disciples. How they loved! How they ministered! 
To catch the smothering significance of the change do but call 
to mind the recent episode in the life of Newell Dwight Hillis. 
I speak not his condemnation for he has only confessed in the 
whole light of publicity the soul declensions that mark us all. 



GEORGE HAMILTON COMBS 157 

But there it is, the humiliating confession that he has loved 
gold more than God and has had primary regard to his own 
ease and reputation when he should have flamed with the pas- 
sion of a Christlike ministry. A Christian? Yes, but what 
worlds separate between him and the Tentmaker who movingly 
cries, ' ' I count all things but as refuse that I may win Him ! ' ' 
What a far cry to that triumphing hymn: 

"Earth's palaces, scepters and crowns, 
Their pride with disdain I survey, 
Their pomps are but shadows and sounds 
And pass in a moment away. 
The crown that my Savior bestows 
Yon permanent sun shall outshine; 
My joy everlastingly flows — 
My God, my Eedeemer, is mine." 

it is time to return. Now this is the blessed heartening 
word: The Great Return is under way. 

The signs of it are everywhere. Through the break-down of 
materialistic civilizations, through the disclosures of the insuf- 
ficiency of purely cultured agencies as the instruments of moral 
reform, through the disillusionings of success, through the 
failure of money to secure happiness, through the unsatisfying- 
ness of a denatured religion, through the steady thinking of a 
true science and a true criticism, through the great awakenings 
of a world war there is being brought about the Great Return 
to Faith. Not all have yet seen it clearly but evidences are 
everywhere that the world is now passing through its greatest 
spiritual experience and is now passionately returning to a ro- 
bust faith. In so far as we have not experienced this quicken- 
ing we reveal that we are only the tiny inlets that have not felt 
the surge of the great incoming tides. Flippancy is now the 
sure mark of the provincial; spiritual dilettanteism the sign 
of the untraveled mind. The present day prophets of dissent 
are truly the ' ' minor ' ' prophets and only in the popular Ameri- 
can magazines are there yet to be heard the echoes of a disap- 
pearing unfaith. 

The ransomed of the Lord are returning — to God. If the 



158 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Frenchman who a few decades ago declared, "Science has taken 
God to the very edge of the universe and politely bowed him 
out," could return to earth today he would not feel at home 
even in his native land, for France today believes in God. If 
the German savant who boastfully said, "Neither the micro- 
scope nor the telescope has revealed God, and therefore he 
must be sought only in the dreams of his creator, man, ' ' could 
revisit the Fatherland today he would be ill at ease, for all 
over the German Empire today is heard the name of God. 

The change of attitude is most distinctly seen in the bold 
personalizations in all references to the Deity. Men no longer 
speak with Omar of the "Hand that writes;" with Spencer, 
"Of an infinite and eternal energy from which all things pro- 
ceed;" with Arnold, "Of a power not ourselves that makes for 
righteousness;" nor even with Wordsworth of 

"A motion and a spirit that impels 
All thinking things, all objects of all thoughts 
And rolls through all things," 

but— of God. Gone are the "Fates," the "Its," the "Ener- 
gies," the "Tendencies," and once more has come back to 
earth the old-time affirmation, "I believe in God Almighty, 
maker of heaven and earth." God! A God who cares, a God 
who can help. 

' ' Our God, our help, in ages past 
Our hope for years to come, 
A shelter from the stormy blast, 
And our eternal home. ,, 

Not that men are comprehending God; not that they have 
clear thoughts about him and his ways. It is something higher 
than that. The world is accepting God today precisely because 
it cannot understand him. It believes in his ways because they 
are not man's ways. 

' ' God moves in a mysterious way 
His wonders to perform ; 
He plants his footsteps on the sea, 
He rides upon the storm." 



GEORGE HAMILTON COMBS 159 

But whether upon land or sea, in calm or in storm, in the 
light or in the dark, still and ever — God. 

There is the return to the Bible when Protestantism broke 
with Rome, mistakenly it felt that it must have a substitute for 
Roman infallibility, Roman authority, and so instead of Pope 
there was substituted a Book — a book letter-perfect because 
every letter was handed down from above, and miraculously 
preserved from slightest error — a Book with no earth mold on 
it whatsoever and as clean divorced from human instrumentali- 
ties as if angels had handed it down from the skies — a Book 
therefore that clothed with the sovereignty of infallibility 
should speak to all the generations. From this mechanical and 
extreme view there was easy swing to the other dangerous ex- 
treme, and from bibliolatry to rationalistic criticism the pendu- 
lum rebounded. And so the truth was being crucified between 
two thieves. For rationalistic criticism was as great a thief as 
bibliolatry. At its worst it stripped the Bible of all sovereign- 
ties. It degraded it into a mere bit of literature, made short 
shrift of the supernatural, blotted out all angel faces, talked 
about a "progressive revelation," with such emphasis upon the 
progressive that it forgot there was also a revelation, and at the 
end of its skillful vivisection embalmed the remains and laid 
them away with the other so-called "Sacred Books" of the race. 
At its best it was never positively religious. I make bold to 
say that criticism of any kind can never be worshipful. For 
criticism means detachment, aloofness. When the lover can ala- 
lyze his lady's face and into the study of its miracle-beauty can 
bring full play all his critical faculties, he has ceased to be a 
lover. When you can listen to that great organ, and escaping 
the least of its golden wizardry, concern yourself chiefly with 
the how and why of tone productions, you have ceased to 
worship at the shrine of music. When the other day a friend 
gave me a kodak picture of my mother, I couldn't think even 
for a moment of the mechanics of photography — it was my 
mother's face! And in such plight was the critic. And in 
such plight was the Bible. But a mighty change has come 
within these last few years. Bibliolatry, worship of the book 



160 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

is clean discredited. And, blessed be God, a rationalistic criti- 
cism is in like disrepute. In Germany, its motherland, and in 
England, its daughterland, this swelling Caesar is laid quite 
low, and none is left so poor as to do it reverence. Only in our 
own country do we yet hear its echoes, and it is reserved for a 
few American professors and preachers to tog themselves out 
with these theological cast-offs. There should be no censure of 
these gentlemen, no bitter cry of "heresy;" rather only pity 
for the unfortunate who must wear the clothes that bade good- 
bye to the looms a decade ago and that were first worn by 
another. 

Meanwhile the world is going back to the Book. It must 
go back. It was said at the outset that there is no progress in 
the values of Truth, of Perfection, of the great ultimates, and 
if the Bible reveals the truth, as it does, — the truth about human 
responsibility, privilege, duty, immortality, God and the heaven 
above; if the Bible reveals perfection, as it does, — a perfect 
standard of conduct, a perfect life, a perfect remedial force; if 
the Bible voices the ultimates, as it does — God having in times 
past spoken unto the fathers by the prophets by divers portions 
and in divers manners; having spoken unto us by his Son, 
whose words need no revision, but are the grand amen of the 
revelation of heaven, then there can be no advance beyond this 
Book; then the quest of the ages is ended; then those who have 
been seeking "the pearl of great price" may cry "Eureka, 
Eureka — I have found it!" 

' ' Holy Bible ! book divine ! 
Precious treasure! thou art mine." 

There is a return to the Supernatural Christ. 

The attack on the miraculous Christ was not a drive at the 
center, the life, but at the ends, the virgin birth and the 
physical resurrection. Deny a miraculous beginning, deny a 
miraculous close, and it as surely follows as the night the day, 
that there will be a denial of all that lies between. Thus it in- 
evitably developed. Bowl one miracle over and soon none will 
be left. Let there be no harsh words here. Let it be granted 



GEORGE HAMILTON COMBS 161 

for argument's sake that these critics sought only to smooth the 
path of faith. It was a high aim, but it was a sorry perform- 
ance. Strengthen faith by the denial of the virgin birth and 
the acceptance of the inevitable corollary that Jesus was but the 
natural son of Joseph and Mary ! Build up faith by the denial 
of the resurrection and the affirmation that somewhere beneath 
the Syrian sky there rots the body of the present king ! What 
tragical blundering in thinking! Even if the miraculous life 
were brushed aside, there remains the yet more difficult task 
of the explanation of the miraculous effect. Explain the thirty- 
three years in the light of a rationalistic philosophy and then 
try the explanation of nineteen hundred miraculous years. Ac- 
cept, if you will, the easy explanation that Jesus was of purely 
human birth, lived a purely human life, died a purely human 
death, and then answer the tremendous question, how could 
such a life have so profoundly influenced the age in which he 
lived and all the ages that have followed? How did this scep- 
terless teacher come to the lordship over all? 

This and a thousand unuttered things are the inspirations of 
the great return. It is a return not to a saintly teacher but to 
a divine Lord. It is a return not only to a king but to a Savior. 
It is a return not only to the preacher on the green mountain 
sides but to him who could say "Thy sins be forgiven thee," 
and "if any man believeth in me, he shall never die." Listen 
to the world song: 

1 ' To Him who loved the sons of men 

And washed us in His blood, 

To royal honors raised our heads, 

And made us priests of God. 

' ' To Him let every tongue be praise, 
And every heart be love ; 
All grateful honors paid on earth, 
And nobler songs above. ' > 

The world is also returning to the consciousness of Angelic 
Presence. In a recent editorial in the British Weekly — a paper 
that has the same place in England that The Outlook, say, has 



162 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

in America — there is stoutest contention that the church has 
gone back to a recognition that we are surrounded by Spirit 
Presences. The angels have come back to earth. How hard 
to accept this, and yet, how much harder to reject it. Granted 
that man is a spirit, why should he claim to be the only spirit. 
It is as if the clod should say "I am the world of matter. I 
am matter and there is nought else besides. There are no 
granite bases for the mountains, there are not white chalk 
cliffs of Dover. There are no pearls in the deep mines, there 
are no seas that sweep over the world. Matter is clod ; clod is 
matter; there is nothing else beside." It is as if the grasses 
were to say "We are of the vegetable kingdom — grasses are 
living things; living things are grasses. How foolish to talk 
of flowers and ferns and wheat and swaying trees. Besides our 
greening carpet there is nought else. ' ' It is as if the fox should 
say, "I am of the animal kingdom, I am the animal kingdom. 
How foolish to talk of leopard and lion, of antelope and horse 
and of that mythical creature, man!" Oh, nothing is so illog- 
ical as logic, nothing so unreasonable as reason, no dark so 
great as the light. 

The world wanted to get rid of mystery — Angels, Seraphim, 
Cherubim, spirits of just men made perfect, these moved all in 
that shadowy kingdom, and we thought we could blow them like 
soap bubbles away. 

But we are going back. Rationalism banished all spirit 
forces, a deeper rationalism is bringing them back. 

Rationalism stripped bare the skies, a deeper rationalism is 
repopulating the earth and the heavens and we are being ringed 
round with spirit presences. 

And finally there is a return to prayer. There was prayer in 
the great beginnings. The early Christians were men of 
prayer. "Behold he prayeth" — could be said of any follower 
of the Nazarene in the early morn. 

Then came the blight of rationalism. Why pray? Prayer- 
lines run out into the dark of the incomprehensible ; therefore, 
pray no longer. 



GEOBGE HAMILTON COMBS 163 

"O where are kings and emperors now 
Their glories wax and wane, 
But, Lord, thy church is praying yet 
A thousand years the same." 

But the church was not praying. It had well-nigh ceased to 
pray. Only the other day I heard a most worthy preacher say 
"We are to have a departure in our church in the nature of 
our midweek meeting. Instead of usual prayer service we are 
to have lectures on vital themes — something worthwhile." Oh, 
did he fully comprehend what he said? Is not prayer worth- 
while ? This note is not accordant with the spirit of the hour. 
For, unbelievable as it is, the call of prayer has gone up from 
every land and the world is upon its knees. All men are at 
prayer — Kaiser and king and Czar and peasant. 

Prayer is everywhere — in courts and senates, and chapels 
and churches and mansions and the hovels of the poor. Hush ! 
the world is praying. It is a prayer in the dark; it is a 
prayer in ignorance ; it is a prayer inwrought with many fool- 
ish notions — but it is a prayer. 

The most real thing in this world today is prayer. It is a 
prayer for guidance, for comfort, for help. ' ' God help me to be 
a clean man." "God help me to be a good mother." "God 
bring my loved ones back from the war." "God be merciful 
to me, a sinner." The petitions are as varied as human needs, 
but from the simple ' * Now I lay me down to sleep ' ' of the lit- 
tle child to the intercessory prayer for nations, it is the utter- 
ance of a great trust. 

Sometimes it is the prayer of reproach. "0 God, why did 
you smite me with this illness?" "Why did you take away my 
beloved husband ?" " Why did you let my baby die V ' " Why 
did you rob me of my sons on the battlefield?" But still it is 
prayer and through want and word, aches of body and soul, 
and poverty and danger and fire and flood and blood and tears 
the world is being bound together in prayer. It is well. 

''Prayer is the simplest form of speech 
That human lips can try; 
Prayer the sublimest strains that reach 
The Majesty on high. 



164 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

"Prayer is the Christian's vital breath, 
The Christian's native air; 
His watchword at the gate of death 
He enters heaven with prayer." 

And so the world, I say, is going back. Shall we go with it ? 
"Oh," you say, "I only would that I might!" But though I 
might return to God, to Faith, to the Bible, to the supernatural 
Christ, to prayer, one thing I may never get back — my white- 
ness of soul!" But you may. Thank God there is wide pro- 
vision for your cleansing. Not all the waters of all the seas 
can cleanse the soul of a Lady Macbeth or of you, but there is 
that which may whiten and cleanse. Through Jesus Christ our 
Lord is full and free forgiveness of sins. The past can be 
wiped out. 

"The dying thief rejoiced to see 
That fountain in his day, 
And there may I, as vile as he, 
Wash all ray sins away." 

Free, forgiven, sin stains all washed away — that we may all 
be if only we shall return to God. 
Let us go back ! Let us go back ! 



ISAAC J. SPENCER 

ISAAC J. SPENCER, the subject of this sketch, was born In Belmont 
county, Ohio, and was reared upon a farm. At the age of eleven, on 
account of the death of his father and two older brothers, the management 
of the farm devolved upon him and his grief -burdened mother. They were 
successful in their business and when, eight years later, he decided to quit 
the farm and to prepare himself for the ministry of the gospel, a wealthy 
and worldly old uncle wept to think that so good a farmer would degenerate 
into a preacher. 

After receiving such instruction as could be obtained, at the point of a 
hickory switch, in the "White Oak Grove" schoolhouse, one mile from his 
home, he attended Hillsdale College in Michigan for two sessions and after- 
ward taught for the same length of time in the public schools. 

The ministry of the gospel was chosen after much prayerful deliberation 
and in the face of tempting inducements to become an educated land-owner 
and farmer. He had an idea, then, that a very useful field lay before the 
scientific and expert agriculturalist. He had joined the Methodist Episcopal 
church, at an early age, going to the mourners' bench, and later into his 
mother's barn to pour out his soul in prayer for some token of forgive- 
ness and acceptance at the hands of the heavenly Father. Having become 
convinced, when teaching school, that nothing but an immersion in the name 
of Christ answered 1 to the scriptural act of baptism and that only repentant 
believers were scriptural subjects of the ordinance, he left the Methodist 
fold and united with the congregation of Disciples of Christ in Morris- 
town, Ohio. Later he was ordained by that congregation as an evangelist. 
Before he left the Methodist denomination he preached one sermon at the 
request of his uncle, Rev. Jesse Van Law, a devout and gifted Methodist 
minister. His text was Neh. 4:6: "So we built the wall, and all the wall 
was joined together unto half the height thereof; for the people had a mind 
to work. ,, 

After spending two weeks in conference with his esteemed uncle he deter- 
mined to take his uncle's advice and enter Bethany College, from which 
institution he graduated with honors in 1875, delivering the valedictory of 
his class. Later his Alma Mater conferred upon him the degree of LL.D. 

His first regular pastorate was with the First Christian church in Bel- 
laire, Ohio, with which he has held four evangelistic meetings in which there 
were many conversions. A Sunday-school address he had delivered led to 
his engagement as the minister for this church. He was called from Bel- 
laire to the First Christian church, in Baltimore. He spent two years as 
pastor of that congregation, during which time the church was strengthened 
by many new members. During* his brief ministry in Baltimore, he had the 

165 . 



166 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

privilege of co-operating with Dwight L. Moody, for four months, in a very 
successful series of gospel meetings. Mr. Moody's simple, scriptural method, 
of preaching produced a profound impression upon Dr. Spencer. 

He was married in 1878 to Miss Louise Pendleton, of Louisa County, 
Virginia, a daughter of Dr. Philip B. Pendleton, and a niece of Dr. Wil- 
liam K. Pendleton, then president of Bethany College. 

Dr. Spencer's health failed him in the Monumental City and he went 
South, occupying J. S. Lamar's pulpit in Augusta, Georgia, during the 
autumn and winter of 1880, during the absence of Mr. Lamar in New York. 
Both Mr. Lamar and Mrs. Emily Tubman urged him to consent to become 
the pastor of the First church, in Augusta; but he had accepted a call 
to Clarksville, Tennessee, and refused to allow himself to be considered by 
the congregation as the successor of Mr. Lamar. From Clarksville he moved 
to Virginia, and, in addition to preaching every Sunday, was for nine years 
the editor of the Missionary Weekly. The journal grew in circulation, 
especially in the East and South. Later, when Dr. Spencer's health was 
fully restored, and the paper was published by a stock company, in Kich- 
mond, Virginia, he accepted a call to Winchester, Kentucky, where for two 
years he enjoyed a very happy and successful ministry. Since the begin- 
ning of his pastorate with the Winchester congregation he was instrumental 
in adding more than four hundred to the number of Disciples of Christ in 
that city. 

From Winchester he went to the Broadway Christian church, in Louisville 
and after a short, but fruitful pastorate there, accepted a call to the Cen- 
tral Christian church, in Lexington, Kentucky, which he had served for 
twenty-three successive years on the 31st day of December, 1917. 

He is a trustee of Hamilton College, a curator of Transylvania College, 
a director of the National Board of Ministerial Relief, a member of the 
National Commission on Christian Union, a director of the Christian 
Board of Publication and served for fifteen years as a member of the 
Executive Committee of the Foreign Christian Missionary Society. In 
1913 he made a three months' tour of Palestine and the Orient, through 
the kind courtesy of the Central Christian church to which he ministers. 

He is the father of four children, one son and three daughters. Mrs. 
Spencer has been his intelligent, efficient and beloved helpmeet, especially 
gifted as a lifelong Bible teacher and Christian worker. 

During 1915 the Central Christian Church dedicated a new educational 
building of three stories, more than forty classrooms and segregated de- 
partments and redecorated and improved its splendid auditorium. The plant 
is now supposed to be worth approximately $125,000. 

Dr. Spencer is an expository preacher. His sermons are richly freighted 
with Bible quotations. From these he draws his lessons, which are enforced 
with an earnestness that carries conviction to many hearers. He unites the 
qualities of a pastor with those of an evangelist, and therefore he believes 
in preaching the simple gospel in its facts, conditions and promises, and 
as a consequence, his is always a growing church. 




Yoras fraternally, 




THE KEY TO SPIRITUAL KNOWLEDGE 

By I. J. Spencer 

Text. — "If any man willeth to do his will, he shall know of the 
teaching, whether it is of God, or whether I speak of myself. 
He that speaketh from himself seeketh his own glory; but 
he that seeketh the glory of him that sent him, the same is 
true, and no unrighteousness is in him." — John 7 :17, 18. 

IN this text is found the secret of Divine knowledge. Christ 
revealed it. Great intellectual wisdom is not necessary in 
order to understand the teaching of Christ. But, to under- 
stand him one must obey him. To enjoy the light one must 
walk in it. Inward obedience is the key to the instruction of 
Jesus and of the Scriptures he came to fulfill. 

He was speaking in the temple. The Jews marvelled at his 
knowledge, because he had not studied and been instructed in 
their schools. He explained that his message was not his own, 
but his Father's, and that he knew it through seeking the 
Father's will.. He affirmed that he did always the things that 
were pleasing to the Father. The Father, dwelling in him, did 
the works and spoke the words. He said he could do nothing 
of himself. As he heard he judged. He told Philip that he 
that had seen the Son, had seen the Father. The invisible God 
was made visible in the Son. In the Son dwelleth "all the 
fullness of the Godhead." God was in Christ, reconciling the 
world unto himself." "The only begotten Son, who is in the 
bosom of the Father, he hath declared him." 

But the Savior went farther than to say that he, himself, 
knew the Divine will because he did it. He declared that the 
principle of knowing the Divine teaching through doing it, 
was universal in its application to men. He said: "If any man 
willeth to do his will, he shall know of the teaching." 

How, then, may one know the truth of religion? Study, says 

167 



168 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

the world. Obey it, said Christ. Did he, then, discourage 
study? He uttered no word against the acquisition of infor- 
mation through the schools. Christianity stimulates inquiry 
and extends the field of investigation. Education is indispen- 
sable to mental, moral and material progress. But human 
reason, disciplined in the academies and universities, cannot, 
without Divine revelation, enter and explore the supernatural. 
As the builders of Babel, with " bricks for stone and slime for 
mortar," failed to construct a tower tall enough to pierce the 
heavens, and create for them a name that all might fear, so 
flesh and blood, independently of help from the Almighty, can- 
not comprehend him nor understand the spiritual meaning of 
his word to men. Even Nicodemus, "the teacher of Israel," 
did not know the necessity of the heavenly birth, in order to 
see the kingdom of God. "Except one be born again," said 
Jesus, "he cannot see the kingdom of God." Its glory may 
flash all about him, but he has no eyes to see it, except they be 
opened and anointed from above. The knowledge of the Divine, 
like Jacob 's ladder, must be let down from heaven to cheer the 
wayworn pilgrim. Zophar, the Naamathite, inquired of Job: 

"Canst thou by searching find out God? 
Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? 
It is high as heaven; what canst thou do? 
Deeper than Sheol; what canst thou know?" 

Human science has wrought wonders in its proper sphere. 
But its realm is the natural and not the supernatural. "No 
man hath ascended into heaven, but he that descended out of 
heaven. " " That which is born of flesh is flesh ; and that which 
is born of the Spirit is spirit." Human knowledge of the hu- 
man elements in Christ and in the Scriptures, is within the 
reach of human achievement. But the domain of the super- 
natural is forever fast-closed against the most ambitious and 
exhaustive efforts of men, unassisted by revelation. The dis- 
ciples of Jesus had learned much of his external, human per- 
sonality and teaching before they came to Caesarea Phillippi; 
but when Simon Peter had confessed him to be "the Christ, 
the Son of the living God," Jesus answered: "Blessed art thou 



ISAAC J. SPENCER 169 

# # # f 0Y fl^ an( j blood hath not revealed it unto thee; 
but my Father who is in heaven. ' ' The spiritual truth, realized 
and confessed, had not been a nesh-and-blood discovery. 

This important principle of interpretation accounts for the 
fact that great scholars, learned scientists, philosophers and 
leaders of thought, who do not believe in God, cannot be 
trusted as guides concerning the supernatural. The highest 
criticism that would exalt the human in Christ, or in the litera- 
ture of the Bible, while denying or skillfully ignoring the 
superhuman, is blind and cannot lead one into the light and 
liberty of the spiritual. Even the most gifted and famous of 
scholars must be regenerated before they can see and become 
instructors in the things of the kingdom of heaven. 

In view of the claims of skeptical, modern scholarship and 
criticism, it is important to stand steadfast upon this impreg- 
nable rock, this Gibraltar of truth, apparent in the text. The 
multitudes, who saw and heard Jesus, comprehended only the 
natural. The regenerated, alone, know how to regard and 
adore him. All study of the Bible history, of its literature, of 
its method of transmission, translation and preservation; all 
examination of the human elements that enter into its construc- 
tion, its verification and the usual laws of interpretation, fail to 
open the sealed book of God's revelation to the race. "The 
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; 
for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know them, 
because they are spiritually discerned." (1 Cor. 2:14). "In 
the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom knew not 
God." The world cannot receive "the Spirit of truth," said 
the Savior, "for it beholdeth him not, neither knoweth him." 

Think of a mole hunting the north star ; a fish describing the 
Alps ; an owl trailing an eagle ; a mouse wrestling with a lion ; 
a dog chasing the lightning; an infant lifting the seas or dip- 
ping up the Atlantic in a spoon! 

Away with microscope and scales, telescope and scalpel; 
away with all physical instruments and experimentation ; away 
with all ambitious study and mental surveys to discover God, 



170 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

unless led by light Divine shining into the understanding and 
warming the heart into love and obedience. 

In order to make our study of the text as comprehensive and 
profitable, as possible, within the limits of a sermon, let us con- 
sider it further under the following three propositions: 

1. The knowledge of the Divine truth is received through 
obedience to God. 

2. Genuine obedience has its beginning and determinative 
quality in the will. 

3. Those who do, and know the will of God, commend it to 
others who know it not. 

I. That the knowledge of the Divine truth comes through 
obedience is amply illustrated in the Scriptures. The psalmist 
said, long ago, "I understand more than the aged, because I 
have kept thy precepts." The ground of his superior knowl- 
edge was his obedience. Jesus told the Jews that the reason 
they could not understand his speech was because they were 
the children of their father, the devil; and it was their will to 
do the lusts of their father. (John 7:43,44.) Their lusts 
prevented their spiritual enlightenment. Those who indulge 
the desires of hell cannot understand the secret of heaven. 
Jesus exclaimed, in one of his prayers, l ' righteous Father, the 
world knew thee not, but I knew thee; and these knew that 
thou didst send me; and I made known unto them thy name." 
"The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him." (Psalm 
25:14.) The prophet Daniel expressed the same idea, in saying: 
"None of the wicked shall understand, but the wise shall un- 
derstand." 

Humility and docility invite and obtain the revelation of the 
Divine wisdom. This truth brought thankfulness to the lips of 
Jesus, when he said: "I thank thee, Father, Lord of heaven 
and earth, that thou didst hide these things from the wise and 
understanding, and didst reveal them unto babes; yea, Father 
for so it was well-pleasing in thy sight." God hides himself 
and his will from the great students and accomplished scholars 
of the world who are puffed up with philosophy and erudition. 
But he reveals himself unto babes — unto the docile, childlike, 



ISAAC J. SPENCER 171 

unspoiled, innocent and obedient. Such a discrimination 
seemed good in his sight. 

When Jesus taught in parables, he did so lest the proud and 
wicked should learn and profane his truth. When God put a 
sword at Eden's gate it was for protection against profana- 
tion and human misery. When he makes the clouds his chariot, 
and surrounds his throne with clouds and darkness, it is for the 
sake of tender mercy. On all his glory he has placed a "de- 
fense." When God veiled himself in human form, and dwelt 
among men, he did so for compassion; condescending to their 
low estate, that he might exalt them through their regenera- 
tion. No man could see God in his unclouded glory, and live. 
He has always come, and will come, in clouds. The Scriptures 
are veiled to the hardened and unbelieving. "But whenso- 
ever a man shall turn to the Lord, the veil shall be taken 
away." (2 Cor. 3:14-16.) Because when men knew God, "they 
glorified him not as God, neither gave thanks ; but became vain 
in their reasonings, and their senseless heart was darkened." 
(Eom. 1:21.) Like many since their day, "professing them- 
selves to be wise, they became fools." The church at Ephesus 
was admonished to remember whence it had fallen, and re- 
pent and do its first works; or else Christ would remove its 
golden candlestick. Humility is a cardinal grace. We have 
its perfect type in Christ. In him the greatest became the 
servant of all. Because he humbled himself, becoming obedi- 
ent even unto the death upon the cross, he is exalted and given 
the name above every name and all shall worship at his feet. 
Nebuchadnezzar's pride was humbled, through insanity that 
made him eat grass as an ox, until he learned that the Most 
High ruleth in the kingdom of men. The first beatitude, in the 
Sermon on the Mount, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs 
is the kingdom of. heaven," is a Divine recommendation of 
humility. If "theirs is the kingdom," then the knowledge of 
the kingdom is theirs also. 

Another requisite in the knowledge of Deity, is faith. 
"Without faith it is impossible to please God; for he that 
cometh to him must believe that he is and that he is a rewarder 



172 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

of them that diligently seek him." Unbelief darkens one's 
understanding; but faith illuminates it. James warns the 
doubting, unstable soul not to ' ' think that he shall receive any- 
thing of the Lord." He cannot receive the truth. 

Repentance, too, is a requisite to the radiant vision of the 
Almighty and his will. "If I regard iniquity in my heart the 
Lord will not hear me. ' ' Neither will he show me the path of 
life. He hideth his counsels from the wicked. Isaiah pro- 
claims that if God's people will loose the bonds of wickedness, 
deal bread to the hungry, bring the poor to the house of 
worship, and will cover the naked, then their "light shall 
break forth as the morning." As the Sodomites were blinded 
by their lust, and could not find the door, wherein the angels 
stood, so sin closes the way to heaven and darkens its light. 
"The god of this world" still blinds "the minds of the un- 
believing" that the light of the gospel should not dawn upon 
them. (2 Cor. 4:4.) 

The Laodiceans were blind and poor, miserable, wretched and 
naked but thought they were rich and needed nothing. The 
Divine remedy offered to them was to "be zealous and repent." 
Both Peter and James, in their epistles (James 1:21, and 1 Pet. 
2:1), urge the putting away of wickedness, guile, hypocrisies, 
envies, evil-speaking — and all filthiness — in order to "receive 
the implanted word" that saves. The privilege of repentance 
is one of the supreme permissions of infinite Love. The power 
to exercise it is weakened through delay and neglect. The 
parable of the sower shows the unpreparedness of human 
hearts to understand the word and to receive it. The hard, 
the superficial and the thorny soil must be broken, deepened 
and cleansed by repentance, to make it honest and good. 

Prayer, likewise, is an avenue to the spiritual mysteries of 
the sacred writings. In the Psalms is the heartfelt and instruc- 
tive petition: "Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold 
wondrous things out of the law." 

Purity and singleness of heart contribute to the knowledge 
of spiritual intelligence. Another beatitude, in the Sermon on 
the Mount, — "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see 



ISAAC J. SPENCER 173 

God," — which beatitude is generally located in paradise, but 
is applicable here and now, indicates the preparation for con- 
templating the word and character of Jehovah. David asks, in 
the twenty-fourth Psalm: 

"Who shall ascend into the hill of Jehovah? 
"And who shall stand in his holy place?" 

Then he answers his own question: 

"He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; 
"Who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, 
"And hath not sworn deceitfully." 

"If the eye be single, the whole body shall be full of light." 
Selfish, self-centered and worldly people, however brilliant or 
scholarly, are only "blind leaders of the blind." 

Love is especially essential to the understanding of our heav- 
enly Father. "Everyone that loveth is begotten of God, and 
knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God 
is love." (1 John 4:7, 8.) No one can know the spirit of his 
own loving father, according to the flesh, if he have not the lov- 
ing spirit of his father. Our Savior taught that if men loved 
him they would keep his commandments. He that willeth to do 
his will is he that loveth him. Paul's wonderful prayer, re- 
corded in Ephesians, was offered to the end that his brethren 
might be strengthened through the Spirit; and that, being 
"rooted and grounded in love," they might be able to appre- 
hend, with all saints, the breadth, length, height and depth, and 
"to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge." To 
know the love that passes knowledge is to know spiritually 
what no one can know naturally. Love is the aptest pupil in 
the school of obedience. It is love that shows a willingness to 
suffer; to take up the cross and to follow Christ even unto the 
death of self -hood; to be a soldier and endure hardness, re- 
proach, affliction; and to know the fellowship of Jesus' suffer- 
ings, being conformed unto his death. "Before I was afflicted 
I went astray; but now I observe thy word." "It is good for 
me that I have been afflicted; that I may learn thy statutes." 



174 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

The last reference, from the Scriptures, that I will give un- 
der this head, is stupendous in its scope. The apostle Peter, 
who encouraged a readiness to suffer in the name of Christ, 
mentioned seven qualifications which Christians should add to 
their faith, in order to be industrious and fruitful unto the 
knowledge of the Lord Jesus. They are courage, knowledge, 
self-control, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness and love. 
If these be in us, and abound, says the apostle, they make us 
fruitful in Christian knowledge. But "he that lacketh these 
things is blind." 

The numerous passages I have quoted from the Bible, show 
how grandly true is the proposition, and how important the 
fact, that the knowledge of Divine truth is received through 
obedience ; for all the virtues named in the quotations may be 
summed up in the comprehensive term, obedience. 

II. Turning now to consider the obedience that unlocks the 
storehouse of spiritual wisdom, I observe that it has its begin- 
ning and its determinative value in the will. 

It will surprise one who has not examined the word of God 
with reference to the will, to learn how often it is mentioned 
as determinative of one's character. "If ye be willing and 
obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land." "If any man 
willeth to do his will, he shall know of the doctrine," 
whether it be divine or only human. "He that seeketh 
the glory of him that sent him" — seeketh his will and will- 
eth to do. it — "the same is true, and no unrighteousness is 
in him." Seeketh answers to willing; and brings both knowl- 
edge and righteousness. Many think of righteousness as a robe 
which, by "faith alone," one puts upon his soul. This exalta- 
tion of "faith alone" to the skies, and the dragging down of 
obedience, has wrought vast mischief in the church. "My lit- 
tle children," wrote the aged apostle John, "let no man lead 
you astray: he that doeth righteousness is righteous." The 
eleventh chapter of Hebrews gives emphasis to the faith that 
did something, obediently and nobly. "Faith, if it have not 
works, is dead in itself." Abraham's faith wrought with his 
works, and by them "was made perfect." No one can become 



ISAAC J. SPENCER 175 

righteous by passivity. The call of the cross of Christ is a call 
to sacrifice, heroism and helpfulness. 

"Ye will not come to me," said Jesus to the Jews, "that ye 
may have life." They searched the Scriptures for eternal life; 
but did not accept the sovereign key. 

It was the turning point in the history of the prodigal 
son, when he said: "I will arise and go unto my father." It 
was the fundamental wrong in his brother, that he "would not 
go in" to share, with the father, the prodigal's restoration. 
Jesus wept over Jerusalem when it refused his proffered mer- 
cies. He would have gathered its children together as a hen 
gathers her chickens under her warm and protecting wings; 
but Jerusalem "would not." He would have saved the rich 
young ruler, but the latter would not obey his counsel. He 
loved his vain riches and the pleasures of sin, so much that he 
chose the wrong instead of the right, and went away sorrowful 
but unwilling to walk in the narrow way, to ultimate treasures 
and unutterable joy. 

When Jesus saw the multitudes of superficial disciples going 
back from following him, he said to the twelve: "Will ye also 
go away?" It was a time to test their will. Simon Peter an- 
swered: "Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of 
eternal life." He chose to follow, though following meant 
martyrdom. He was willing to glorify his Lord in his death 
as well as in his life. 

Every invitation of Jehovah is an appeal to the will. He 
offers grace and strives to persuade the people to accept it. 
" Choose ye this day whom ye will serve." The challenge came 
from the prophet. The choice lay with the people of Israel. 
"To whom ye present yourselves as servants unto obedience, 
his servants ye are whom ye obey." " Thanks be to God," said 
Paul to the church at Rome, "that, whereas ye were the serv- 
ants of sin, ye became obedient from the heart — from the 
will — to that form of doctrine, whereunto ye were delivered." 

The heavenly Father calls to all his children who stumble 
and stray: "Today, after so long a time — after so many oppor- 
tunities and mercies — if ye will hear his voice, harden not your 



176 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

hearts. ' ' The gracious, illuminating principle which the apostle 
Paul applies to financial contributions to the church, applies in 
all fields of obligation, as well as in the giving of money, 
namely: "If there be first the willing mind, it (i. e., the act of 
obedience) is accepted according to that a man hath; not ac- 
cording to that a man hath not." God requires only what we 
are able to bestow; and honors our will in the bestowal. God 
is reasonable and practical. He appeals to love and common 
sense. He regards the motive power that drives the machinery 
of every one's life. 

The eleventh-hour laborer, in the parable, received as much 
reward as others, who worked longer, because he served will- 
ingly; and, unlike other employees, had no heart for mur- 
muring nor for boasting. Willingness is not supineness. It is 
not lying down and giving up. It means tremendous activity 
and all the energy of which one is capable. The life of godli- 
ness means to fight, to wrestle, to press forward, to work, to 
run the race, to crucify the flesh and to overcome the world, 
the flesh and the devil, through the word of God assimilated 
in our characters. 

"Will you hold this bridge?" said a military commander to 
his subordinate. " I will try, " replied the latter. "That is not 
enough," responded the commander. "Then, sir, I will hold 
the bridge," answered the brave colonel. The answer was ac- 
cepted and, true to his promise, the colonel held the bridge. 
There are too many peace colonels in the church, honorary 
colonels who never held a bridge nor a trench; captured a 
prisoner, led a charge nor overcame an enemy. The energy, 
courage and perseverance of the soldiers at Verdun should be 
excelled by the soldiers of Jesus Christ. 

"You come to me with a sword and a spear," said David to 
Goliath, "but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts." 
"Ye have not yet resisted unto blood," may be said to the ma- 
jority of church members. 

The widow, with her mites, received Divine commendation 
for her liberal giving. The rich, who cast much into the 
treasury, had no praise. Their offerings were external. Her 



ISAAC J. SPENCER 177 

offering was in her will. The Lord saw the obedience in her 
heart and rejoiced. 

There is a world of difference between wilful, presumptuous 
sins and unavoidable errors. Saint Paul said he obtained 
mercy because he persecuted the church in ignorance. He did 
not harden his will against the light. He was obedient unto 
the heavenly vision. Abraham was willing, despite his emo- 
tions, to sacrifice his son. God accepted the will for the out- 
ward deed. The guilt or righteousness of a man is in his 
intention. 

To love the Lord with all one's heart, and his neighbor as 
oneself will insure obedience to the one and kindness to the 
other. But, we should remember that obedience in one's will 
was never accepted as a substitute for obedience in the letter 
when the latter lay within his power. "If a man love me, he 
will keep my words," and "He that hath my commandments, 
and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me," said the Savior. 
All love and willingness toward God tend to fashion them- 
selves in ultimate obedience. There is such a thing as obedi- 
ence in the letter without the spirit. There is, also, such a thing 
as obedience in the spirit without the letter. Of the two the 
latter is preferable. But what God wants is obedience in 
both, unless the spirit of obedience be hindered by some power 
outside the will. The greatest power of any one is his will 
power. It is this which the Almighty seeks to enlist. He 
stands at the door of every man's heart and knocks, saying: 
"If any man will open unto me I will come in." The two 
wills in harmony bring heavenly communion. 

These numerous testimonies frOm the sacred writings prove 
conclusively the strategic proposition that obedience, in God's 
sight, has its beginning and its determinative value in the will. 
I will now ask your attention to the last division of my sub- 
ject, which I regard as a necessary inference from the text: 

III. Those who do, and hence know the will of God, com- 
mend it to those who know it not. 

If the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of 
God, neither knoweth them, how is he to be persuaded to be- 



178 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

come spiritual? Just as' God by his incarnation sought to save 
the lost. God spoke through the example of Jesus. This is a 
mighty challenge to Christians to exemplify in their character 
and deportment the teaching of Christ, which the unregenerate 
cannot understand unless translated into visible, personal be- 
havior before them, day after day in multitudinous manifesta- 
tions. It is not enough to distribute Bibles and circulate good 
literature. It is not enough to preach the gospel orally. It is 
not enough to profess it. The most common and formidable 
excuse offered by persons of the world for not joining the 
church, is that large numbers of church members do not live up 
to their profession. It must be conceded that current Chris- 
tianity is not a worthy representation of Christ and his gospel. 
Such an excuse ought not to be possible. In numerous places 
and frequently it has not been possible. There are hundreds 
of Christians in a community like this, where there are many 
churches, who do commend their religion by their lives. But 
there are other hundreds whose influence is not with Christ but 
against him. (Matt. 12:30.) 

There are some remains of good in every person. None is 
totally depraved. But the preacher, presenting the gospel 
message from the pulpit, cannot overcome the barriers set up 
by. unfaithful members of the congregation against the conver- 
sion of the world, outside the church. The church must re- 
pent. It must commend the gospel. Backsliders must return 
and humbly confess their sins. Churches must become helpers, 
and no longer remain stumbling stones to those outside their 
fellowship. "Take away the stone," said the Master at the 
grave of Lazarus. His power to restore the dead to life waited 
upon the faithful co-operation of Lazarus' friends. The great- 
est problem in the church is how to get all church members to 
practice their religion faithfully. 

"Ye are our epistle, known and read of all men," wrote 
Saint Paul to the Corinthians. He added that it was "written 
not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God. ' ' Churches 
and individual church members, especially prominent mem- 
bers, are read every day by the world. I would that every 



ISAAC J. SPENCER 179 

member were indeed written "with the Spirit of the living 
God." 

Jesus said to his disciples: "Ye are the light of the world." 
He did not say that Bibles are the light of the world. The 
world is not reading the Bible. The world could not under- 
stand the Bible if it read it. The word translated into human 
life and conduct is far more powerful and more easily under- 
stood by the unregenerate than if presented abstractly. The 
church is called the body of Christ. As in his body the Divine 
was incarnate so in us should be his Spirit of love and purity 
and power. "Let your light so shine before men that they — 
the unregenerate — seeing your good works — visible and easily 
appreciated — may glorify your Father, who is in heaven." 

Jesus knew that example was better than precept. Samples 
are more convincing than sermons. With God, light fed by the 
oil of love, is at a premium. The following reference to light is 
instructive: "Do all things without murmurings arid ques- 
tionings; that ye may become blameless and harmless, chil- 
dren of God, without blemish in the midst of a crooked and 
perverse generation, among whom ye shine as lights in the 
world; holding forth the word of life" — the best way to hold 
it forth — "that I may have whereof to glory in the day of 
Christ, that I did not run in vain, neither labor in vain." (Phil. 
2:14-16.) 

Paul was in prison, when he wrote these words to the church 
at Philippi. But as he thought of the light shining in that 
city, through his brethren, whom he had converted from 
heathenism, he felt that his work had been successful. He 
rejoiced to contemplate the joy they might afford him in the 
day of judgment. 

One of the most practical requests, ever made of Christian 
women, is that which the apostle Peter made, that wives be in 
subjection to their own husbands ; that even if their husbands 
obey not the word, they may without the word, be gained to 
the church by the behavior of their chaste and exemplary 
wives. Even modesty in dress is commanded as the index of 
an incorruptible, meek and quiet spirit which is of great price 



180 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

in the sight of God. The wives are challenged to do by their 
personal example and influence what the preaching and teach- 
ing could not accomplish. 

"Ye are the salt of the earth," declared the Savior to his 
disciples. He did not specify the spoken truth as salt, indis- 
pensable as it is. But Christian people are the salt to save the 
earth. A thousand church members, with the savor of Christ, 
are more useful than ten thousand sermons. The program of 
worship, in the sanctuary, is not so impressive as the presence 
and attitude of the members in whose religious life the world 
has confidence. The personnel of the membership speaks louder 
than the voice of the preacher or the choir. The best sermons 
cannot advertise the gospel as well as the best Christians. 
While, therefore, the unsaved cannot understand God as pre- 
sented abstractly in preaching and teaching, they can be 
tremendously interested and influenced by the concrete exhi- 
bition of Christianity in the daily lives of Christians. 

Obedience, as we have seen, has its fountain and determina- 
tive value in the will, the heart, the intention. It must be 
genuine. If genuine it will find its issue in external manifes- 
tation unless prevented by some power outside the will. God's 
method of winning the world to the word of life is through 
the shining, inspiring and alluring example of church members, 
ordained to "shine as lights in the world." First, we must 
purge ourselves from unrighteousness, that we may be vessels 
unto honor, sanctified and meet for the Master's use. Second, 
we must see that the church membership continually commends 
the Christian life. 



CHARLES REIGN SCOVILLE 

MR. SCOYILLE was born on a farm near Butler, Indiana. He spent 
his boyhood days helping his father on the farm and roaming 
through the woods and along the "crick" banks that combined to make 
the countryside around Butler a little strip of heaven "all to itself." 
He entered Butler High School. Within a short time, however, he was 
forced to return to the farm, and this time, some real hard work, owing 
to financial reverses suffered by his father. Later he returned to high school, 
graduated and entered the Tri-State College at Angola, Ind. He worked as 
a janitor of one of the buildings in order to pay his way through the in- 
stitution. He completed the scientific course of this college, graduating in 
1892, receiving the B>.S. degree. Mr. Scoville entered Hiram College at 
Hiram, Ohio, in 1895 and took the ' ' Clerical Ministerial Course, ' ' graduat- 
ing in 1897 with an A.B. degree and again in 1898 with an A.M. degree. 

After having spent several years in evangelistic work he went to Chicago 
and organized the Metropolitan church, beginning with 107 members. A 
few years later there were 600 members and a Sunday school of 500. He 
was identified with this church for five years. Then he decided to again 
enter the evangelistic work, starting with himself and a singer. Today his 
company numbers fourteen persons. He never has severed his connection 
with the Chicago church, however. 

Mr. Scoville has made two foreign trips, one* in 1900, and in 1912 he 
made a World Tour of Evangelism, taking his evangelistic company of six 
special workers. He held meetings in the Christian churches of Sydney, 
Melbourne, Perth and Adelaide, Australia, in 1912, with many converts. All 
the Churches of Christ in these cities united in the great central meeting. 

Mr. Scoville has conducted campaigns in many of the largest cities of 
the country in the last eighteen years, including New York, Chicago, Pitts- 
burgh, Cleveland, Columbus, Akron, Youngstown, Indianapolis, Evansville, 
South Bend, Logansport, Minneapolis, Kansas City, Springfield, Spokane, 
Tacoma, Portland, Pasadena, Long Beach, Little Rock, Dallas, Houston, 
Beaumont, Topeka, Wichita, Pueblo, Emporia, Hutchinson, Anderson, Jef- 
ferson City, Oklahoma City, Des Moines, Jacksonville, Fla., etc. 

Mr. Scoville organized and carried with him the largest evangelistic 
company ever carried by an evangelist of the Christian church and he has 
had the largest ingathering that any evangelist has ever had in the Churches 
of Christ in America. 

Uniqueness is not necessarily opposed to universality. Indeed no one 
can be even general in characteristics without he has first of all a distinct 

181 



182 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

individuality. Paul was unique — was unlike both Jew and Gentile, and he 
could be either — was either when it was necessary. 

The preaching of Mr. Scoville is certainly unique, but for this very reason 
it suits, the crowd. The circle of his power may not include all the critics, 
but thousands come within its influence who would never be touched by a 
preaching which moves along the usual course. The stereotyped style of 
preaching is doubtless somewhat worn out with the masses and it requires 
a Scoville, or a Billy Sunday, to gain the attention of the passing throng. 
But these very people must be saved if the world is ever converted to Christ. 
YThereas Mr. Scoville 's preaching is fearless and he makes no effort to 
dodge anything in the Bible, yet I do not attempt to describe his preach- 
ing. ~Ko one can do this. He occupies a field by himself, and whether his 
methods are the best or not, it is probable that he could not successfully 
work on the old lines even if he were to try to do so. That he moves whole 
communities where others have failed is at least a proof that he has a place 
to fill. Let us then be thankful for these unique evangelists, as long as they 
do not require the rest of us to adopt their methods. 

The Disciples have had much of their phenomenal growth by encouraging 
evangelistic fervor. Some of the latter day methods are different from 
those used by such men as "Walter Scott, John T. Johnson, T. M. 
Allen, and others who might be named among the pioneer evangelists. But 
perhaps the time has come when we may change our methods somewhat if 
we do not thereby destroy our principles. 







Very Fraternally 



(^yjb^A (f^^W sS^v-«^r , 



PREACHING OF THE CROSS-THE 
POWER OF GOD 

By Chas. Reign Scoville 

Text. — For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish fool- 
ishness; out unto us which are saved it is the power of God. 

For it is written, I ivill destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will 
bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. 

Where is the wise? Where is the scribe f Where is the disputer 
of this world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of 
this world? 

For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew 
not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to 
save them that believe. 

For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom: 

But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, 
and unto the Greeks foolishness; 

But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ 
the power of God and the wisdom of God. 

Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weak- 
ness of God is stronger than men. 

For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men 
after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called; 

But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound 
the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world 
to confound the things which are mighty: 

And base things of the world, and things which are despised, 
hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to 
nought things that are: 

That no flesh should glory in his presence. 

But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us 
wisdom, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemp- 
tion. 

That according as it is written, he that glorieth, let him glory 
in the Lord. 

And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency 
of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony 
of God. 

For I determined not to know anything among you save Jesus 
Christ and him crucified. — (1 Cor. 1:18-31; 2:1,3). 

183 



184 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

PAUL states frankly in the seventeenth verse of the 1st chap- 
ter that Christ sent him "To preach the gospel not in the 
wisdom of words lest the cross of Christ should be made void," 
or as the King James Version states it, "of none effect." For 
he says, "The preaching of the cross is to them that perish fooL 
ishness but unto us who are saved it is the power of God." Un- 
doubtedly you are thinking just now that according to Romans 
1:16, "The gospel of Christ is the power of God unto salvation." 
That is true but let us remember that the first resounding note 
of that gospel is, that "Christ died for our sins." (1 Cor. 15:3.) 
The Cross stands, among schemes of redemption, just where 
Christ stands among men. Without the shedding of blood 
there is no remission of sins. Paul everywhere confronts the 
Jews with this dreadful cross, and it is almost impossible for us 
to conceive the horrible shock which this message brought to 
their self-satisfied natures, unless we remember that the cross 
in that day stood for exactly what the ghastly gallow T s, the 
hangman's nooze or the electrocution chair stand for today. 
It was just as despicable, just as horrible, just as shameful and 
disgraceful as is any manner of execution of the worst criminal 
of this day. Paul said, "Christ died even the death of the 
Cross. " But this shameful, disgraceful cross is today the power 
of God. The Cross once stood for weakness but now stands for 
power, it once stood for shame, but now stands for glory, it 
once stood for defeat but now stands for victory, it once stood 
for death but now stands for life. 

Turn the wheels of any machinery backward and you will 
find a grave. Turn the wheels of the Government backward 
and you will find Valley Forge, Gettysburg, Appomattox, San 
Juan Hill, Manila Bay — graves without number. Go to New 
York and Brooklyn Bridge. Who knows how many lives were 
sacrificed before the first abuttment had reached the water's 
level? Go to the great steel plants and note the underground 
passage ways through w^hich they carry out the dead. Go to 
the pineries or the powder factories, or the mines or the mints — 
the graves of the dead are there. Or take the railroads as an 
example, more men are killed every year on the railroads than 



CHARLES REIGN SCOVILLE 185 

have ever been killed in any year of any war that has ever been 
fought except only this horrible World-War now on. Hence 
I repeat, turn the wheels of any machinery backwards and you 
will find a grave. And this same universal rule holds in the 
religious realm. "Christ died for our sins." The Lamb slain 
from the foundation of the world. "He poured out his soul 
unto death." "The last enemy that shall be destroyed is 
death. ' ' But when this corruptible shall have put on incorrup- 
tion and this mortal shall have put on immortality then shall 
come to pass the saying that is written, death is swallowed up 
in victory." (1 Cor. 15:54.) And this victory comes through 
the crucified, risen, regnant Lord. The Christ of Calvary is 
"The King of Glory." 

"My faith still clings to Calvary, 
To Calvary, to Calvary; 
Where lifted up for you and me, 
The Son of God I see. 

"His precious blood my only plea, 
My only plea, my only plea; 
He poured it out on Calvary, 
For me on Calvary.' ' 

The Cross stands first, as God's Powerful Expression of His 
Idea of Sacrifice. I repeat it, Sacrifice, not Slaughter. Bigoted 
infidels have blatantly acclaimed that they would not worship 
a God who would slaughter his Son. Our Savior gloriously pro- 
claimed, ' ' I lay down my life, no one taketh it from me. ' 7 

When the Greeks were besieging Troy it is said that Calcas 
told them that if they would sacrifice Iphigenia, the beautiful 
daughter of King Agamemnon to the Goddess Diana that this 
would appease the wrath of the goddess. They took her by 
force and if she had not escaped that would have been slaughter. 
But our Shepherd giveth up His life for the sheep. Just as 
Horatius and his comrades offered themselves at the Bridge 
of Rome, or the nobles of Calais who came with ropes around 
their necks and offered themselves to Henry VI if he would but 
spare their children. So Christ died, the Just for the Unjust. 

In the Civil War a man who had been drafted had a sick wife 



186 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

and child, and a neighbor's boy took his place and went to the 
front and was killed. It is said that after the war this man went 
to the Southern battlefield to find the grave of the man who 
took his place, who died in his stead. Christ took my place. 
He was wounded for my transgressions. He was bruised for 
my iniquities. 

Sacrifice is the highest expression of love and devotion. Just 
as when a father and mother in a family of three adopt two or 
three more of their neighbors' children because the parents of 
these children have passed away. This first father and mother 
are willing to toil a little harder, sacrifice a little more and 
do it all in love. "He hath bourne our griefs and carried our 
sorrows. ' ' 

It is said a father and son were digging a well when bad air 
or damps began to gather at the bottom of this well and they 
signalled for the men at the windless to pull them up. But the 
rope began to snap and the father saw instantly that one of 
them must perish, and kissing his boy goodbye he dropped 
back, a willing sacrifice, in order that his son might live. ' ' God 
so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that 
whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have ever- 
lasting life." 

The last glass of water on a famishing ship, the last life boat 
that pulled away from the Titanic, are but faint illustrations 
of the last agonizing cry in that dark hour on Calvary. God's 
powerful expression of his great idea of Sacrifice. 

The statement or story which Wm. E. Gladstone made one 
day before Parliament brought the British Empire to tears. 
The little son of Princess Alice was dying, and when the Red 
Cross nurse notified the mother she hurried to the sick bed, 
took the little one in her arms and the little weak form, grow- 
ing slowly but surely cold, grieved the very depths of the 
mother heart. The child asked for a kiss and although the 
mother had been warned by the surgeon to neither handle it 
nor breathe its breath, she put kiss after kiss upon the dying 
lips, and Princess Alice and her babe were buried in the same 
grave — a Sacrifice. 



CHARLES REIGN SCOVILLE 187 

' ' See the mother standing by her baby boy, 
With ecstatic eyes and heart that 's filled with joy, 
He to her is purest gold without alloy, 

For him how she prays to heaven above, 
How she guides his footsteps through this vale of strife, 
Watching o'er his bedside when infection's rife, 
Risking for her baby boy her health, her life, 

A sacrifice, a sacrifice." 

Again I say, "God so loved the world that he gave his Son." 
The Cross stands as God's powerful expression of his idea of 
sacrifice. 

In the next place, the Cross stands as God's Powerful Warn- 
ing or Danger Signal. When we boys were skating on the 
ice on the old St. Joe River in Indiana, and found an airhole 
we would put a stick, a rail, a board, or a limb of a tree in it, 
that is if it was in the day time-, and at night time, we would 
hang a kerchief or a lantern on this timber. That was our 
danger. "The soul that sinneth it shall die, and without 
the shedding of blood there is no remission of sin." 

You walk down the streets and you will see a red or a yellow 
card on certain houses, which means that family has been quar- 
antined. You have often seen the same colors on the pest- 
house. In the year 1900 at Ishmalia in Egypt on the Suez 
Canal, I got on board a British ship that was coming from 
Australia to England. We expected to leave the ship at Naples 
and take a trip through Europe from that point. But the Bu- 
bonic Plague had broken out in Sidney two weeks after this 
ship had left that port. This news had been cabled to the 
Continent and the Italian Government caused a yellow flag to 
be hoisted on our boat which meant the ship had been quaran- 
tined. It was a danger signal, and we were not permitted to 
land. Neither was anybody permitted to come on board, so we 
sailed away to Marseilles. The Cross is God's powerful danger 
signal. My friend, you dare not pass that Cross and go on to 
the judgment day with no Christ on the Throne for you. The 
darkening skies, the sufferings and death during that sad hour 
on Calvary, as a danger signal, thunder forth the proclamation 
' ' The wages of sin is death ! ' ' 



188 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

When the Government raises troops, builds a great navy, 
builds mighty forts and fortresses and lays many mines — all 
these are an expression of danger. So the Cross is God's pow- 
erful danger signal. "How shall we escape if we neglect so 
great salvation ? " ' ' What shall the end be of those who obey not 
the Gospel of God?" 

Then again, the Cross stands as God's Power to Save. "There 
is therefore no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. ' ' 
(Rom. 8:1.) "For God sent not his Son into the world to con- 
demn the world, but that the world through him might be 
saved." (John 3:17.) 

On the evening of the Passover Night in Egypt, it is said 
that a Jewess, the oldest child of a certain family, called her 
father and asked him if the blood of the Lamb had been sprin- 
kled upon the door posts and panels? The father replied that 
he had told his sons to do so. To this the daughter answered, 
"Papa, I am the first born, and if the blood isn't there I must 
die tonight." And when the father investigated the blood 
was not there, the boys had forgotten it. Calling his sons the 
father hurriedly went to the flock, caught the lamb and did 
according to the instructions which God had given through 
Moses to the children of Israel. That blood on those door posts 
saved that girl and "the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleans- 
eth from all sin." Have you accepted "the Lamb of God who 
taketh away the sin of the world?" Is his blood, shed on the 
cross, spread on the door posts and panels of your heart and 
life? If so, the Cross is God's power to save you. God would 
have to insult his Son to deny you, if you have accepted and 
faithfully followed the Christ of Calvary's Cross. 

If the wheat or rye or grass covering a great prairie was on 
fire and was sweeping forward ten to twenty miles an hour, a 
veritable blaze five to ten miles wide, if you were in the midst 
of this prairie how could you save yourself ? There is only one 
way, strike a match, start a fire right at your feet, burn the 
grass or grain off of a plot or circle of ground as large as this 
platform or this building or this block, get in the middle of that 
plot, then you will be standing where the fire is past, and you 



CHARLES REIGN SCOVILLE 189 

need have no fears for it cannot burn again. Paul saw that 
Christ did this very thing, with death. At the Cross the King 
of Glory started a fire to burn out sin, in other words he be- 
came the death of death, the grave of the grave, led captivity 
captive, destroyed the destroyer, and became the end of the 
end. No wonder Paul triumphantly laughed aloud, "Ha, ha, 
death, where is your sting? Ho! Ho! grave, where is your 
victory? Thanks be unto God who giveth us the victory 
through our Lord Jesus Christ." The Cross, my brethren, 
stands as God's power to save. 

' ' When I survey the wondrous Cross, 
On which the Prince of Glory died, 
My richest gain I count but loss, 
And pour contempt on all my pride. 

"Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast, 
Save in the death of Christ, my God; 
All the vain things that charm me most, 
I sacrifice them to his blood. 

' l Were the whole realm of nature mine, 
That were a present far too small ; 
Love so amazing, so divine, 

Demands my soul, my life, my all. ' ' 

When I was at Perth in West Australia I secured two dif- 
ferent photographs of a great snake that had swallowed an 
opossum. This snake had swallowed the opossum head first, 
until the snake's mouth came almost to the opossum's hops, 
then when the opossum was about to be suffocated, he dug out 
through the side of the snake 's neck. When they found them and 
when this photograph was taken, the opossum was alive but the 
snake was dead. When that snake undertook to swallow that 
opossum he went too far, and the opossum became the death 
of the snake. So also death had taken every man that ever 
came into the world until Jesus came, but when death under- 
took to take Christ it undertook too much, and Christ became 
the death of death and brought life and immortality to life. 
Because he lives we also shall live. "He is able to save unto 
the uttermost all that come unto God, through him. ' ' 



190 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

In the last place the Cross stands as God's Powerful Expres- 
sion of His Abhorrence of Sin. The gallows and the electric 
chair stand as the state's or the government's expression of its 
abhorrence of the murderer or the traitor. 

On the Cross Christ "poured out his soul unto death and was 
numbered with the transgressors, yet he bare the sin of many 
and made intercession for the transgressors." (Isa. 53:12.) 
"God laid on him the iniquity." 

It is said that a certain heathen king decided to put a mis- 
sionary to death. When the native Christians notified this 
messenger of the Most High he calmly replied, "I can even 
endure this for His sake, who died for me. ' ' On the fatal day 
this missionary was placed upon a high scaffold and under- 
neath this scaffold was fastened a very deep sack, and in this 
sack were all sorts of adders, boa-constrictors and poisonous, 
venomous snakes. It is said this wicked heathen king caused 
this missionary to be stripped naked and then dropped head 
first into this sack of living snakes, scorpions and adders. 
When these snakes lapped their cold slimy forms around his 
naked body, arms and limbs and struck him again and again 
with their poisonous fangs, there was rung from this mission- 
ary, in his death agony, such a tremendous wail that it fright- 
ened the natives so that they went pell-mell in every direction 
through the forest, never having heard such an agonizing 
shriek. Something like that wail must have been the momen- 
tous moment when ' * God lain on Him the iniquity. " I do not 
wonder that rocks were rent: I do not wonder that graves were 
opened: I do not wonder that the sky was dark for the space of 
three hours and the veil of the temple was rent in twain. I 
do not wonder that he cried out, 

"Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?" (My God, my God, why hast 
thou forsaken me?" 

"Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; 
yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. 
But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for 
our iniquities ; the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and 
with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone 



CHARLES EEIGN SCOVILLE 191 

astray; we have turned every one to his own way, and the 
Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all." (Isa. 53:4-6.) 

"Dear, dying lamb, thy precious blood, 
Shall never lose its power; 
'Til all the ransomed Church of God, 
Are saved to sin no more." 

The preaching of the Cross is to them that perish foolishness; 
but unto us which are saved it is THE POWER OF GOD. 



CHARLES JEHIEL TANNAR 

/^ HARLES JEHIEL TANNAR was born on a farm in Sullivan, Ashland 
^ county, Ohio, December 7, 1856. His father died in the prime of life 
when Charles was eighteen months old. The widowed mother, left with 
only a few dollars in money, fought out a hard battle to support herself 
and only child. This mother is still alive at the good old age of eighty- 
six. The boy grew up in the village of Sullivan, went to school in the 
winter and worked for farmers in the summer. He entered Bethany Col- 
lege in 1876 and graduated in the class of 1881 receiving the first honors 
in the ministerial course. 

His first church was in the country and located midway between Akron 
and Medina, Ohio, about fifty miles south of Cleveland. This is known 
as the Granger church. He preached here six years and was called to Mt. 
Healthy, Ohio. This is the church so long served by A. McLean, who was 
still a member of this congregation at the time of this pastorate. From 
Mt. Healthy Mr. Tannar was called to the Walnut Hills church, of Cincin- 
nati, and succeeded S. M. Jefferson. After four years in the Walnut Hills 
church he served the High St. church, of Akron, Ohio, for seven years, the 
Portland Avenue church, of Minneapolis, Minn., between three and four 
years, and pastor of the Central Christian church, of Detroit, Mich., for 
nearly fifteen years. 

He has recently resigned his pastorate at Detroit, and one thing is certain, 
viz., wherever he may locate, or whatever he may do, he can be trusted to 
meet his responsibilities with courage, ability and faithfulness. 

In Mr. Tannar we have ' a quiet, unobtrusive, scholarly preacher. He 
makes little noise, but his pathway is paved with success. He is a better 
pastor than an evangelist, though he has done some good work in the 
evangelistic field. His power is} educational and personal rather than an 
appeal to the emotional nature, though he is not lacking in fine feeling in 
the matter and delivery of his sermons. 

In the committee room of the Disciples, especially as regards missionary 
work, he has been an efficient force, and in executive management in every 
field where he has been tried, he has shown superior gifts. He has none of 
those drawing qualities which distinguish some men, and which are so highly 
appreciated in these days of physical prowess, and progress, nevertheless 
in a somewhat suppressed animation, through culture and clear vision, he 
finds the land of brightness, and in it he works busily to scatter sunshine 
all along* the pathway of souls seeking the high lands of God. 



193 




<2& ^ 






THE UNCHANGING GOSPEL 

By C. J. Tannar 

Text. — I am debtor both to Greeks and to Barbarians, both to the 
wise and to the foolish. So, as much as in me is, I am ready 
to preach the Gospel to you also that are in Rome. For I 
am not ashamed of the Gospel: for it is the power of God 
unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first 
and also to the Greek. — Romans 1 :14-16. 

A THOUGHTFUL Christian man cannot read these words 
uttered by Paul nearly nineteen hundred years ago with- 
out feeling an immediate response to them in his own heart. 

A minister going to a new field, either for evangelistic work 
covering a few weeks, or a settled pastorate of many years, 
instructively selects these words as the best possible to outline 
the convictions of his heart and the great purpose of his life 
work. 

The centuries have come and gone, the world of mankind 
has passed through great changes and overturnings, but the 
gospel is unchanged. Its nature and efficacy and power over 
the souls of men is the same yesterday, today and forever. 

A few points in this changeless character of the gospel are 
all we can note in this brief outline. 

I. 

Its Power to Make Men Feel in Debt to the Whole World 

"I am debtor both to Greeks and Barbarians, both to the wise 
and to the foolish. So as much as in me is I am ready to preach 
the gospel to you also that are in Rome." 

(1) When Paul said, "I am in debt to the Greeks and to the 
Barbarians" he used language that included all nations and 
races and tribes of the earth. When he said, "I am in debt 

195 



196 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

both to the wise and to the foolish," he declared his sense of 
obligation to all classes and conditions of men in all the nations 
and tribes of the earth. They could not be so near or so far 
away ; so high or so low ; so wise or so ignorant ; so good or so 
utterly bad, but what Paul was under debt to them and up to 
the limit of the last moment of his life and the last ounce of 
his vitality he would pay that debt. 

Great man! this Paul, the apostle, and one time Saul, the 
persecutor of all who believed this same gospel. How marvel- 
ous the change in the man and how great the zeal with which 
he put his hand to the new task. How he journeyed by land 
and by sea; how he wrought and suffered and died in his her- 
culean efforts to pay this debt. Here is the secret of his whole 
life. Start with this text and you can explain all he ever did 
and all he ever was. 

(2) It is a most serious matter to be in debt to one man or 
ten men or a hundred men. But it is a terrible thing to feel in 
debt to every man, woman and child in all the world. To feel 
that not one dollar that you have, not one hour of the day, 
not one talent with which you are gifted is really your own. 
All these belong to some one else. They cannot be used for 
self. You are hopelessly in debt, and as much as in you is the 
debt must be paid. 

This feeling of indebtedness the gospel has always produced 
in devout souls in all ages and lands. Its powder in this direc- 
tion was never greater than it is today in the year of our 
Lord 1916. 

(3) Livingstone felt this debt and in the jungles of far 
away Africa, from which he could not be coaxed away, he 
sought to pay it. At last he could not take another step, his 
weary feet refused to move. His faithful black companions 
carried him on to more distant tribes. In the darkness of one 
certain night Livingstone knew his last hour on this earth had 
come. "With what little strength he had left he got out of bed 
and upon his knees an died praying for Africa. There they 
found him in the morning, dead. 

(4) Judson was so overpowered with this sense of indebted- 



CHARLES JEHIEL TANNAR 197 

ness that he sailed for far away Burmah. There in labors and 
sorrows untold and in the death prison at Ava, Judson gave 
thirty-seven years of his life. He died and was buried in the 
ocean from the deck of the ship to which he had been carried 
in a last effort to prolong his life for a few more days' work of 
debt paying. 

(5) In the early days of my ministry I saw G. L. "Wharton 
and wife start for India. After years of toil they came back, 
worn and weary, to rest and recuperate for a few days. Again 
they set their faces towards India. The next time they came 
back to this country it was known that Mrs. Wharton would 
never be able to return to India and it seemed impossible for 
Brother Wharton, in his physical condition, to brave another 
trip to that far-away land. Could he not say "as much as in 
me is," I have paid my debt to India. We all thought so. 
But in his dreams, G. L. Wharton saw the men of India, beg- 
ging him to come back and help them. He finally said, "I must 
go back to India. ' ' He bid his loved ones a sad and long fare- 
well and alone and broken in health, we watched G. L. Wharton 
fade from our vision on his way back to India. He wrought 
well during the few days God gave him and then died peacefully 
and was buried amidst the dark-faced people to whom he gave 
his life in an effort for their salvation. The cable soon brought 
the message of his death across the ocean to the weeping fam- 
ily here. His letters written home kept coming in after the 
cable had announced his death and they seemed like messages 
from the other world. G. L. Wharton could do no more to pay 
his debt. 

(6) But what shall we more say for the time would fail us 
to even mention the names of a great company in all ages and 
lands and from all walks of life who have felt their debt to 
others and to the best of their ability have paid it. Some have 
been well known and some not known at all; they have filled 
positions in the eyes of the world or perhaps in humble ob- 
scurity have wrought out their days' work. But all of them, 
like Paul of old, accepting God's gift to them through the gos- 
pel of Christ, have in return been made debtors to the world. 



198 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

II. 

It Commands the Unqualified Confidence of Its Advocates 

"I am not ashamed of the gospel. As much as in me is, 1 
am ready to preach the gospel to you also." 

(1) The gospel is always abreast of the age in which a man 
lives. It keeps pace with the ongoing centuries. In all of our 
advancement the world never gets beyond this ancient gospel. 
We have no occasion to hunt up some new message. At night I 
love to go out and look at the North Star. Wherever I am it 
gives me my bearings. I may travel far on fast trains, but I 
never get beyond the North Star. It keeps up with the through 
limited train on which I ride. My fathers looked at this won- 
derful star in their day and found it abreast of them. My 
children and children's children will take their bearings from 
this same unchanging heavenly sentinel. How good it is to 
have some things that never change in the midst of all the 
changes of time. How fortunate the man who pins his faith 
to some eternal verities and uses them as landmarks or range 
lights. 

(2) If I live until next July, I will have finished thirty-five 
years in the active ministry as a settled pastor. In this more than 
a third of a century I have gone into many pulpits in various 
States, as a regular minister or evangelist or temporary supply. 
I have had the pleasure of preaching from the country cross- 
roads church and little schoolhouse up to the center of the 
great cities. Never have I gone to any people save with Paul's 
declaration on my lips or in my heart — "I am not ashamed of 
the gospel. So, as much as in me is, I am ready to preach the 
gospel to you also." How true this is today of ten thousand 
times ten thousand men all round the world. 

To be sure, now and then, some one will step out from this 
great company of souls loyal to the gospel, and declare the 
world needs a new message. He will proclaim that he has 
found something better and more up to date and more in de- 
mand than Paul's gospel. Dr. Talma ge was a lover of dogs. 
He once owned a very valuable dog who had a mania for gnaw- 



CHARLES JEHIEL TANNAR 199 

ing old dry bones. The good doctor would find this dog out on 
the lawn grinding away on some old bone that he had found 
and carried home. Talma ge was afraid the dog would spoil 
his beautiful white teeth or starve to death on that bone. He 
would take it away from the dog and throw it away over in the 
alley, call the dog in the house and give him a piece of nice 
porterhouse beefsteak. After awhile, missing the dog again, he 
would go out to look for him. There he was out on the front 
lawn with that same old bone under his paw. He had looked 
it up and brought it back. He would look up at Talmage with 
one intelligent eye as much as to say, "You don't know how 
much satisfaction I get out of gnawing this old dry bone. It is 
my dog nature." 

Watch the men who leave the gospel of Christ for more mod- 
ern messages. They are feeding on dry bones. If that is all 
they have they will starve to death. 

I note with pleasure that my good friend, B. Fay Mills, has 
come to himself, repented of his follies and has gone to preach- 
ing the gospel of Christ again. He once preached it with 
great power. How many of us listened to him years ago until 
our hearts burned within us. After a time he forsook this 
ancient message for human philosophy and "science falsely 
so-called. " Here in Detroit I heard him speak of "the dam- 
nable doctrine of the atonement." I went away from that 
address to weep and mourn over my good friend Mills. But 
he has come to himself again and is back in his Father's house 
where there is "bread enough and to spare." Praise God for 
a soul saved. 

(3) This never-changing power and efficacy of the gospel 
was in the mind of Christ when he gave the great commission. 
Said Jesus, "Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to 
every creature." There he left his followers without any 
other message or even the hint of anything more to come. 
They might have asked him, "Master, how long shall we 
preach this one message before you give us something new? 
Shall we preach it one hundred years? That is a long time, 
Lord. A new generation will then be preaching to an entirely 



200 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

new world. Shall it be preached five hundred years? Who 
can think of one message enduring so long? A thousand years? 
Things which happened that long ago seem a myth or a fable. 
When will you give the world something new and up to 
date?" But the Lord had nothing more to give. The gospel 
was the final message. 

(4) Paul felt this truth of the great commission when he 
wrote to the Galatians. "But though we or an angel from 
heaven, should preach unto you any gospel other than that 
which we preached unto you, let him be accursed." It may 
be well to have a wholesome respect for this curse. In Paul's 
esteem neither man nor angel would escape it. What think 
you as your mind goes back over history. Were these idle 
words or were they prophetic? 

Frank Green of Kent, Ohio, was for many years the cor- 
responding secretary of the American Christian Missionary 
Society. He traveled all over the United States in the in- 
terest of Home Missions. One day, far down in the South- 
land he was entertained in the hospitable home of a generous 
hearted Christian man who had fought in the Southern army 
during the four years' war between the North and the South. 
This Southern gentleman and one time soldier, carried an 
empty sleeve as token of his valor. In the quiet of his home he 
told this experience. Along with many of his young friends 
he enlisted early in the war and after some preparatory drill 
the company was loaded on a train and started for the distant 
battlefield where the fight was already on in full swing. One 
day the engine broke down and while being repaired the 
soldier boys were allowed to get off and rest themselves. They 
were near a little country church in the South. It was Sun- 
day and the house was filled with worshipers. The minister 
dismissed the congregation that all might go out and see the 
soldier boys. The commander drew the men up in military 
ranks and the people from the church walked up and down 
the lines, shook hands with every soldier and bid them God 
speed to victory. An old lady, bent with the weight of years 
and staff in hand, walked down the line and shook hands 



CHARLES JEHIEL TANNAR 201 

with all the soldiers and then stepping back some little dis- 
tance addressed them. "Boys, do you know where yon are 
going?" The fire of prophecy seemed to come to her. She 
straightened herself up and threw off the weight of the years 
as best she could and answered her own question. "Boys, 
you are going to fight against the old flag of your country and 
the old flag will wave in triumph over this land when you 
are all dead and in your graves." 

The old lady, staff in hand, went back into the little church. 
The engine was now ready, the soldiers boarded the train, 
shouted goodby to their newly-found friends and were off for 
the battle front. The soldiers talked over the "old woman's 
prophecy," as they called it. Some laughed it to scorn, and 
some were serious. 

"But," said the Southern gentleman, with the empty sleeve, 
"I never could forget the old lady's words. 'Boys, you are 
going to fight against the old flag and the old flag will wave 
in triumph over this land when you are all dead and in your 
graves.' At night in my tent, or out on the lonely picket 
line, or on the bloody field I never could get rid of that 
prophecy. A day came when I was cut down and lay out on 
the field swept by shot and shell, and I thought of it then. 
Finally we surrendered and stacked our arms, and went back 
to our fair Southland so ruthlessly swept by war and the old 
flag still waves in triumph over our country and I am glad of 
it. The old woman's prophecy is true." 

Paul looked far out into the future when he wrote the Gala- 
tian letter. 

(5) Why can we not improve upon the gospel and find a 
better preachment than this ancient but ever new gospel. 
Probably for the same reason that we cannot improve upon 
the sun in the heavens. The same God is the Creator of the 
sun and the author of the gospel. The sun is no more perfect 
for its mission than is the gospel in its great work of salva- 
tion. We are just as certain the gospel will endure until its 
mission is complete as we have faith that the sun in the 
heavens will shine on as long as God's plans for humanity 
need it. Perfection is a characteristic of all of God's work. 



202 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

III. 

In Its Saving Power 

"It is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that 
believeth." 

(1) When Paul wrote to the Greeks he spoke of the wisdom 
of God, but when he wrote to the Romans he emphasized the 
power of God. The Greeks boasted of their culture and wis- 
dom. They were a classical people. This was a race of philoso- 
phers and artists and sculptors. The Romans emphasized 
power. Their armies marched forth to conquer the earth. 
Their ships darkened the seas. They built paved highways 
which radiated out from the golden milestone in the Forum 
to the ends of the earth. In the vision of Daniel this was the 
iron kingdom that beat in pieces all other kingdoms. How 
natural then are Paul's words- to the Romans: "I am not 
ashamed of the gospel of Christ for it is the power of God unto 
salvation. ' ' 

(2) Paul said, "I am coming to Rome to bring the power of 
God. This is a phase of power unknown to you Romans. You 
have long lifted up your eyes to Mt. Olympus and the gods who 
are supposed to dwell there. Your proud emperor will no 
doubt scorn my message, your trained legions will march out to 
battle with little thought of my gospel. But this is the mes- 
sage of that kingdom which the God of heaven is to set up 
and which is to destroy all other kingdoms and fill the earth 
and stand forever. 

(3) The Rome of Paul's day, the eternal city built upon her 
seven hills and from her throne of beauty ruling the world, 
perished long ago. She lies buried beneath the dust and ashes 
of more than a thousand years. Her proud emperors have gone 
the way of all the earth. Her invincible armies are as dead and 
powerless as the autumn leaves of the forest. Her ships have 
all rotted down upon the seas. She lives only on the pages of 
history. But the gospel of Christ is still the power of God unto 
salvation. The gospel is as young as ever. It is clothed upon 
with immortal youth. Its conquests are in every land and on 



CHARLES JEHIEL TANNAE 203 

every shore. Its message is now printed in all the languages 
and dialects of all the earth. The American Bible Society alone 
prints every year six times as many copies of the gospel as the 
sum total of all the novels of every name in the world. Its 
missionaries are now in every land and the peoples who once 
bowed down to stocks and stones are singing praises to God 
because of his wonderful salvation through the gospel of Christ, 
Men and women long controlled by the devil, demons of drink 
and wrecks of humanity have found this gospel the power of 
God to break their fetters and set them free. What marvelous 
things our eyes have seen in this civilized land and what tales 
our missionaries bring back of victories among the heathen. 
Eaces of people so low down in the scale of humanity that we 
are prone to class with animals yield to the uplifting power of 
the gospel and stand forth as examples of redeeming grace. 
Truth is stranger than fiction. No mythological stories can 
compare in wonders with the every-day victories of the gospel. 
Praise God for these marvelous results ! 



ISAAC NEWTON McCASH 

TSAAC NEWTON McCASH, whose biography is taken from "Who's 
-"- Who," was born in Cumberland County, Illinois, June 5, 1861. He has 
the degree of B.S. from the National Normal University, A.M. and LL.D. 
from Drake University. He attended Sumach Seminary, Georgia, and 
Summer School of Theology at Harvard. 

As an educator he served as principal of Ewington Academy, Ohio, 1882- 
84; superintendent of Lyons Public Schools, Kansas, 1885-90; pastor Mary- 
ville, Mo., 1890-93— in this first pastorate he erected a $20,000 church- 
pastor University church, Desj Moines, Iowa, 1893-1904 — during that pas- 
torate he received into fellowship of that congregation 3,027 persons. He 
served fourteen years as trustee, member of the faculty committee and 
special lecturer at Drake University. In that period a physical breakdown 
compelled him to give up pastoral work. He was superintendent of the Iowa 
Anti-Saloon League three years, secured the enactment of the Time Limit 
Bill, and was a member of its National Headquarters Committee. The Cen- 
tennial Convention made him secretary of the American Christian Mis- 
sionary Society. He served the Brotherhood as secretary most acceptably 
for four years and was president of Spokane University from 1913-16, now 
President of Phillips University at Enid, Okla. He is the author of two 
books, ' ' Ten Plagues of Modern Egypt, ' ' and ' ' Horizon of American 
Missions. ' ' 

This record of facts is sufficient to show that the subject of this sketch 
has been a very busy man. Results are the things that measure correctly 
what a man really is. By this rule there can be no doubt about the high 
standing of Dr. McCash. Though still comparatively a young man, he has 
already accomplished more than is done by many men much older. One 
reason of this success is his singleness of purpose, and the energy he throws 
into his work. This trait was finely illustrated while he was Corresponding- 
Secretary of the American Christian Missionary Society. During the whole 
time of this service he attended strictly to the business to which he had 
been called, refusing to turn to either the right or left, and by a prudent 
and energetic course, he did much to make the work of the society a success. 

In the pulpit Dr. McCash is a forceful preacher. His sermons are well 
prepared and delivered with an unction which carries conviction to his 
hearers. "While Dr. McCash is more widely known as a preacher, author 
and platform man of remarkable ability, most of his public career has 
been vitally related to educational work and by temperament and training no 
man is better fitted for the leadership of a university. ' ' 

205 




Yours most oor&iall 



y~k\ 



Cr 



S^&. 



ESTABLISHED IN PRESENT TRUTH 

By I. N. McCash 

Text. — "Wherefore I will not be negligent to put you always in 
remembrance to these things, though ye know them, and are 
established in the present truth/' — 2 Peter 1:12. 



THE ultimate of all inquiry and research should be truth. 
The old, because it is merely old is not to be venerated; 
but the old and the new when true are to be received as vitally 
important. The old impresses most minds because aged. Asso- 
ciations attach themselves to old buildings, old pictures, old 
books and manuscripts and old organizations. The ability to 
endure through the changes of years presupposes vitality which 
belongs to truth — "Truth crushed to earth shall rise again, 
the eternal years of God are hers." If, however, age is the 
only qualification, it must be remembered that error has vital- 
ity and often flourishes as weeds and thorns survive cultivated 
plants. 

Emotions caused by the old and the new are sometimes so 
nearly alike they can be discriminated only at close range. An 
illustration of the two is found in the book of Ezra. There, 
memory of the past and hope for the future met; there, reflec- 
tion and anticipation produced their effects; there, the old and 
the new were together. Old men of Israel, having returned 
from captivity, remembered the former splendor of Solomon's 
temple. They compared and contrasted it with the foundation 
for a new temple under Zerubbabel and wept for its diminished 
glory. The young men and middle-aged who were born in cap- 
tivity and had never seen the magnificence of the old temple, 
rejoiced as they looked upon that foundation for their new 
house of worship. As Ezra approached, he heard the mingled 
cries and shouts of joy and could not discern from a distance 

207 



208 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

their meaning. Reflection and anticipation were weeping and 
laughing together. 

It is a natural characteristic of mind in old age, to revert to 
past associations and experiences. It lives over again in mem- 
ory its early life. The age of a man is indicated by the time he 
lives in the past and disregards relations and interests in the 
present. Dotage and senility may have their young critics ; 
but each generation, if permitted to live to ripeness of years, 
will repeat its experiences and run the course of the aged. 
Many people find acquisition of the new easier than retention of 
the old. Athenians, at the time the apostle to the Gentiles 
visited their city, were accused of giving themselves up to 
hearing and telling some new thing. They did not remember 
the teachings of their own poets who said, "Ye are gods," or 
of their philosophers who to some degree of certainty found 
evidences of a future life and the supremacy of God. The 
apostle Peter acknowledges his duty, "To stir up your pure 
minds by way of remembrance, ' ' and, ' ' Put you in remembrance 
of these things though ye know them." 

Remembrance pointed its finger to the commands of our 
Lord who said, "If ye continue in my word, then are ye my 
disciples indeed; and ye shall know the truth and the truth 
shall make you free ;" to Paul's statement, "I declare unto you 
the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have re- 
ceived, and wherein ye stand; by which also ye are saved, 
if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you," and to the 
apostle James' statement, "Whoso looketh into the perfect law 
of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful 
hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his 
deed." Memory is an essential factor in Christianity. To for- 
get God is to die forgotten of him. 

Opportunity to know truth brings the obligation to know it, 
and sin if neglected. Jesus said, "If I had not come and spoken 
unto them, they had not had sin ; but now they have no cloak 
for their sins; if I had not done among them the works that 
none other had done they had been without sin." 

The end of all serious investigation of science, art, history, 



ISAAC NEWTON McCASH 209 

literature, philosophy, and religion is truth. The holder of 
errors can afford to surrender them though held by ancestors 
for generations. Safety only is in truth; errors must eventually 
bring humiliation and disaster. 

Our day is characterized by restlessness and degrees of un- 
certainty. The political changes which are taking place, be- 
cause of the world war, compel every sober mind to inquire dili- 
gently for truth to account for the cause of these conditions. 
In the religious world, whether in the hemisphere of Protestant- 
ism or Roman Catholicism, creeds and ecclesiastical deliver- 
ances, formerly revered and obeyed, are interpreted liberally 
or have undergone revision. Many of these creeds are like ice 
on rivers whose strong, warm floods are breaking up their cold, 
even surface and floating fragments out to sea. 

Two discernible mistakes are made in searching for truth in 
religion. Both spell failure. The first one of these is that search 
is made at the wrong time and place. The Psalmist long ago 
asked the question, " Where can wisdom be found and where is 
the place of understanding ? ' ' and ' ' even the sea saith it is not 
with me. ' ' Certain classes of seekers look backward, go beyond 
the pale of human investigation and have no answer to their 
inquiries, save the silence of dead ages. They ask, "Is God the 
creator of himself?" "Who is responsible for the origin of 
sin?" "Is it merciful on the part of God to allow man to be 
tempted?" "Was man created or evolved?" All these ques- 
tions may be proper in their place, but if made the basis of faith, 
they create doubt. Present truth, present duties, and present 
opportunities are not to be neglected while speculation confirms 
or condemns. ' ' Secret things belong unto Jehovah but revealed 
things belong unto us and to our children." While the finite 
mind cannot go beyond its limitations, it is not justified in 
halting when full information regarding questions that lie be- 
yond the ken of human knowledge is lacking. If the origin of 
God is too high for our understanding, our faith does not totter 
for the evidence that he is, and that he is the rewarder of them 
that diligently seek him. The Bible reveals, and all nature 
about us declares: 



210 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

"God hath a presence, 
And this you may see 
In the fold of the flower, 
In the leaf of the tree. 

"In the waves of the ocean, 
In the furrows of land, 
In the atoms of granite, 
The mountains of sand. 

"In the sun of the noonday, 
In the stars of the night, 
In the storm-cloud of darkness, 
In the rainbow of light. 

"Gaze where you will 
From the sky to the sod 
And where will you gaze 
That you see not God?" 

If the labyrinth of sin is so devious and long that its begin- 
ning may not be known, present truth is sufficient to establish 
us in a conviction: "The wages of sin is death," and that salva- 
tion is only through Christ Jesus, our Lord. 

Sin in the individual begins with his conscious choice of 
wrong. The awful devastation wrought by sin calls for heroic 
effort to stop its conflagration and prevent "the pestilence that 
walketh in darkness and the destruction that wasteth at noon- 
day. ' ' What would be thought of a physician called to the bed- 
side of a patient suffering with a virulent malady, if he should 
withhold relief while he inquired for parties responsible for 
germs which had begun their destructive work ? What would it 
profit if he should find evidence that Chinese or Italians were 
the distributers? A satisfaction which would come from that 
knowledge would not exempt the physician from responsibility 
of applying remedies for relief of pain and the restoration of 
his patient to health. 

So long as war rages, funeral trains course their way to 
cemeteries, tears stain the face of humanity, crime fills prisons, 
and suffering stalks abroad, so long will that present truth ob- 



ISAAC NEWTON McCASH 211 

tain: salvation in Jesus Christ is the only remedy for sin. Look- 
ing backward is an attempt to turn the shadow on the dial-plate. 

Another class of religious thinkers makes the mistake of 
looking at the distant future. They ask questions pertinent and 
adapted to occasions, but without immediate value and often 
with damage to spiritual life and service. 

These searchers for truth ask about the future, "Is there a 
place or condition called heaven?" "Will the streets be paved 
with literal gold?" "Is there real hellfire for the wicked?" 
"Is punishment everlasting?" "Will Jesus reign on earth in 
person ? " " When is the millennium ? ' ' Could all of these ques- 
tions be answered promptly and certainly, that knowledge 
would not take away the present truth that preparation must be 
made now for our future life, the coming of Christ, the Church 
of the First-born, the enjoyment of all that is reserved for the 
pure in heart, and the millennium. So ardent have some become 
in interpreting the remotest future that they have turned 
prophet, gone beyond Revelation and drawn followers after 
them. In three-quarters of a century the date of the second 
coming of Christ has been announced several times, only to 
disappoint the credulous. Jesus said, "No man knoweth the 
day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh." The an- 
nouncement of a definite day by men contradicts the teaching 
of the Word. What will it profit though it be known that 
Christ will reign upon the earth in person a thousand years, if 
men are indifferent to preparation for his immediate coming 
at their death ? What will it profit if the heavens be of a glory 
transcending all figurative language, if we neglect present 
truth, present duties to serve God, and present privileges to 
be ready to dwell with him? 

Standing between the distant past and the near or remote 
future, there is present truth upon which to stand with safety 
and assurance. All doubt will be taken away and confidence, 
fixedness and establishment take its place. 

Where shall we look for establishment in faith? First, to 
the Word of God. "The entrance of Thy Word giveth light; 
it giveth understanding to the simple." "Sanctify them," or 



212 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

set them apart, "through the truth;" "Thy Word is truth." 
Some question the genuineness and trustworthiness of the 
Word of God. Proofs of its truthfulness are shown in the 
harmony of manuscripts and by critics who test it. Claudius 
Buchanan, in 1825, in Farther India, found forty-eight feet of 
manuscript made of thirty-seven skins. All of the Old Testa- 
ment, except Leviticus and part of Deuteronomy were writ- 
ten on them. Comparing that discovered document with 
known manuscripts, there were only forty differences between 
it and them. Those differences were immaterial. 

John Mill, over two centuries ago, made a critical examina- 
tion of the 1300 whole and fragmentary manuscripts of the 
Scriptures, in the many languages and from different coun- 
tries in which they were preserved. He found in the aggre- 
gate fifty thousand interpolations, omissions and errors. In 
that number, so designated, were counted commas, punctua- 
tion marks of all kinds, prepositions and conjunctions and 
definite and indefinite articles. Such an array of errors 
seemed appalling and threatened to unsettle the faith of be- 
lievers in the Word of God. An analysis, however, of the 
so-called errors showed that only two hundred passages would 
be changed in their significance. Of these two hundred varia- 
tions, only fifty of them affected materially the meaning of the 
passages; and not one of those doubtful interpretations per- 
tained to the salvation of a living soul. John Mill's scholarly 
testimony established and confirmed the faith of men in the 
Word of God. 

Archaeology has also rendered valuable evidence of the re- 
liableness of the Bible. Of the approximate number of six hun- 
dred cities, villages, and places mentioned in the Bible, four 
hundred and eighty of them, west of the Jordan, have all 
been identified. East of the Jordan, most of the remaining 
one hundred and twenty have been found, but a few are in 
the region held by fanatical Mohammedans who have not al- 
lowed exploration. 

The unearthing of the Shalmanezer monument, now shel- 
tered in the British Museum, establishes the truth of the 



ISAAC NEWTON McCASH 213 

biblical statement that Assyrians besieged Samaria and cap- 
tured it. Inscriptions on the monument show Omri and Jehu 
paying homage and tribute to an Assyrian king. 

The Tel el Amarna tablets confirm the Scriptures through 
the preserved correspondence among contemporary kings re- 
garding their military strength. Evidence brought to light 
by pick and spade testify to truthfulness of the Word of God. 
Centuries come and grow old, generations arise and fade as 
flowers; but the Word of God "lives and abides forever." 

That truth as revealed in the Bible is all sufficient for guid- 
ance in faith and conduct. That word unmodified by creed 
and ecclesiastical deliverances is the only basis upon which 
the Christian world can come to a unity of the faith in Christ 
Jesus. Let the Christian world stand in the same attitude 
toward the Word of God that the apostle Paul ever held when 
he said, "I received of the Lord that which I delivered unto 
you." Eeceiving the Scriptures from the Lord and delivering 
them, unmodified, to the people as the Lord's instructions, 
divisions in Christendom will be without occasion. 

Second, for establishment in the truth we turn to the results 
of Christ's teaching. The apostle Peter declared, "The time is 
come for judgment to begin at the house of God." He meant 
what we term by the judgment; namely, the right idea, cor- 
rect opinion and sensible notion of things. His declaration 
was made when the condition of the world showed radical 
differences between its ideas, opinions and notions, and the 
judgment of Christianity. When Christ's teachings began 
their projection, womankind was considered inferior to man, 
a menial servant, without the right of education, and with 
few privileges. Christianity began the right idea or judgment 
stated by Christ, "Mary hath chosen the better part which 
shall not be taken away from her." Apostles declared, "In 
Christ Jesus ye are neither male nor female," and "God is 
no respecter of persons." That judgment began with the 
house of God and has broadened in influence co-extensive with 
Christian lands. The centuries have seen every nation ac- 
knowledging Christ according woman her rights and privi- 



214 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

leges. Where that judgment has not gone, she is still servant, 
burden-bearer, habitat of the harem, and the toy of passion. 

When the apostle Peter gave that announcement, race 
hatred was universal. A Roman drew his tunic about him and 
boasted of his blood, and said, "It is better to be a Roman 
citizen than to be a king." All who were not of his nation- 
ality were barbarians. The Jews despised the Gentiles; and 
Samaritans were dogs in the eyes of Hebrews. From the house 
of God went forth this judgment: "God hath made of one 
blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, 
having determined their appointed seasons and the bounds of 
their habitation," and, "In Christ Jesus ye are neither Jew 
nor Greek, — Scythian nor barbarian, but all are one." Race 
hatred is evident in some parts of the world today, but inter- 
national antipathy and racial prejudice are overshadowed by 
Christian ideas of sympathy and brotherhood. 

Again, when the apostle Peter spoke of the going forth of 
judgment from the house of God slaves were held by every 
nation. The strong claimed the right of might to make serv- 
ants of the weak. From the head of the church was given, 
"One is your master, even Christ, and all ye are brethren." 
Preachers of the gospel in all centuries have carried that 
judgment of right relations into all lands. Slaves have been 
freed and given their citizenship. The power of Christ 's teach- 
ing emancipates slaves. 

In the beginning of Christianity intemperance was preva- 
lent in all countries, including Israel. Drunkenness char- 
acterized all feasts, even the Greek symposium. Judgment 
upon such a notion of life began with the house of God when 
Jesus refused to drink from the sponge dipped in highly intox- 
icating vinegar and myrrh. Voicing his example the apostles 
everywhere taught, "Be not filled with wine wherein is ex- 
cess, but be filled with the spirit." That right notion of so- 
briety has been carried by Christianity into all countries. 
Every land indoctrinated by Christian instruction is yielding 
to its judgment against the beverage liquor traffic, that it 
must be banished from the world. These evidences of Christ's 



ISAAC NEWTON McCASH 215 

teaching unveil the truth in which men are rooted and form a 
solid basis upon which faith is established. 

A survey of the agencies inspired by and permeated through 
and through, by the teaching of Christ, furnishes a long cate- 
gory of Christian societies like the Y. M. C. A., Y. W. C. A., 
Christian Endeavor and W. C. T. U. working mightily to 
change conditions in human associations. We cannot now 
speak of these. 

Third. The hearts of men are established in Christ himself. 
"Ye are complete in him," for, "He is made of God unto us 
wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemp- 
tion." He is the embodiment of truth. He said, "He that 
followeth after me shall not walk in darkness but shall have 
the light of life." Christ, the incarnation of that essential 
truth which must be appropriated by men, is perfect satis- 
faction to the human mind and heart. Christ living in the 
hearts of his followers exemplifies to the world the strongest 
influence here and hereafter. Christ has gone like the sun at 
evening beyond our vision, but like the unhidden presence of 
the sun reflected in the moon, he is imaged in the life of his 
followers. He cannot be hid now any more than the luminary 
of the solar system is hid in the boundless expanse, when the 
shadow of our earth veils it for a few hours from a part of the 
inhabitants. Men's completeness is in Him. 

Nothing is complete in itself. A lump of coal placed in a 
stove without draft or access to air to allow oxygen to unite 
with the carbon, will no more burn than a stone. Trees with- 
out their roots and rootlets delving in the earth, finding 
moisture and soil ingredients, perish. So there is in Christ a 
uniting of the divine with the human to make a Christian. In 
Him are found the responses to a craving to know, and a long- 
ing to live in a happier and better relation. Without Him 
men are as vines, yielding no fruit. 

Finally, if the world is seeking a firm foundation upon which 
to rest in truth, it must search in the right fields, at the right 
time, and in the right spirit. With the light Christ has 
thrown upon salvation from sin, resurrection from the dead, 



216 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

and immortality, we may be established in present truth, and 
bear with patience trouble, toil, pain, and partings here, while 
we look for an unbroken rest with elevated pleasures over 
there, of which the heart cannot conceive. 



FRANK M. DOWLING 

r pHE subject of this sketch came of good religious stock. He was born 
■*- in Wood County, Ohio, August 18, 1861, and though that was at the 
beginning of our Civil War, young Dowling did not inherit its spirit, for 
he has always sought those things that make for peace. His father and 
mother were William and Mary Dowling, his father being well known as 
an efficient pastor and evangelist. His grandfather, Jackson Dowling, was 
one of the early preachers of the Eestoration Movement. 

Early in life Frank developed a taste for learning. After sufficient 
training he entered Bethany College, West Va., and was graduated from 
that college in 1885, with first honors of his class, making the commence- 
ment valedictory address, and class oration, also the valedictory for the 
Neotrophian Literary Society. 

Laden with academic honors, he soon became pastor of the Christian 
church at Mt. Healthy, Ohio, near Cincinnati, succeeding A. McLean. From 
1887 to 1892 he occupied the chair of Latin in Bethany College. Part of this 
time he was secretary of the faculty and pastor of the Bethany church. 

He was married in 1888 to Miss Bertha B. Paul of Hopedale, Ohio. 

In 1892, he moved to California and has been permanently identified with 
the Disciples of Christ in that great state ever since, filling important posi- 
tions in churches and state organizations, and always acquitting himself to 
the entire satisfaction of his brethren. In general, religious and social work 
he has also been an active worker, and in the lecture field he has also been 
successful. 

The following endorsement is sufficient to show his popularity as a lec- 
turer : 
To the Lyceumites of America: 

It is with sincere pleasure that I present to the patrons of the Lyceum, 
Rev. Frank M. Dowling, of Pasadena, California. I know him well. I have 
listened to him often with pleasure and profit. His ideas are his own; his 
manner is his own; his tender earnestness, his infectious humor, his hap- 
piness of illustration, his voice and gesture, all are his own — he is all 
"Dowling." Most cordially do I recommend him to committee and 
audience. ROBERT J. BURDETTE. 

He has been called the "Apostle of Sunshine," and this is a very ap- 
propriate characterization. 

As a pastor he has been eminently successful. His sermons are lit up 
with his genial humor, and both as a preacher and Christian gentleman he is 

217 



218 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

one of the most popular men among the Disciples. Hej has resigned his 
pastorate at Fullerton, and removed to San Dimas, Cal. 

Mr. Dowling is one of the few men who has not been spoiled as a 
preacher by the popular lecture platform. It is somewhat difficult to com- 
bine these two things without spoiling one or the other, but it seems that 
Mr. Dowling has solved the problem as far as possible for he has won a 
fine reputation in both fields, and best of all he has never lowered his 
ministerial calling by his platform presentations. 



THE APPEAL OF THE CROSS 

By Frank M. Dowling 

WHATEVER may be our view as to the necessity and 
meaning of Christ's death we all feel that the subject 
demands the most reverent treatment, and we feel this not 
simply because we are entering into the innermost sanctuary 
of his sorrow, but because we feel — we cannot escape the feel- 
ing — that Christ's death has a meaning that attaches to no 
other death, and somehow is related to our peace and pardon 
and everlasting life. And so, my brethren, as we go together 
up the holy hill of Calvary, let us purge our thoughts from 
all impurity and pride, and, standing there open-souled toward 
God, with perfect sincerity, and, with a deep heart-hunger 
for truth and holiness, it may be that this will be the hour 
when the death of Christ for our sins will appear unto us as 
the wisdom of God and become unto us the power of God unto 
our present and eternal salvation. 

Brethren, touching the place of the death of Christ in the 
Christian system, if we are willing to enter the Scripture hold- 
ing in our hands the lamp lighted by Thomas Campbell when 
he said: " Where the Bible speaks, we speak, and where the 
Bible is silent, we are silent, ' ' we shall be satisfied that men of 
"light and leading" have been justified in regarding Calvary 
and not Bethlehem as the focus of revelation, in declaring the 
death of Christ to be the center of gravity and the organizing 
idea of Christianity. With Jesus his death was not an after- 
thought, not merely a martyrdom from which he could not 
escape, not merely the natural end of a human career; it was 
the will of his Father, it was that for which he was mani- 
fested in the flesh, for he declared that the Son of Man came 
into the world to give his life a ransom for many, and con- 
templating his death he said, "But for this cause came I to 
this hour." 

219 



220 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

The importance which Christ attached to his death is shown 
by the times when and the circumstances in which he spoke of 
it to the disciples, and the persistency with which he pressed 
the subject upon them, even though the result was their utter 
bewilderment and their alienation from him. 

After the resurrection, and the instruction of the forty 
days of his frequent presence with them, and especially, after 
the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit, who came to them on 
the Day of Pentecost, according to the promise made to the 
troubled ones in the "upper room," the disciples, so far from 
being offended and baffled and discomfited and grieved by the 
thought of Christ's death, received the teaching of Christ con- 
cerning his death with their whole hearts, made it, with its 
meaning, the sum and substance of their preaching, the heart 
and soul of their message, their first and their final appeal to 
men — their Gospel. 

Paul delivered unto the Corinthians first of all that which 
he also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the 
Scriptures, and he was determined to know nothing among 
them save Christ and him crucified, and, though the preach- 
ing of the cross was to the Greeks foolishness, and to the 
Jews a stumblingblock, he knew it to be the wisdom of God, 
and the power of God to those that were being saved, he, 
therefore, glorified in nothing save in the cross of the Lord 
Jesus Christ, and so he sums up his entire message as the 
"word of the Cross." 

The place assigned to the death of Christ by the other dis- 
ciples is the same as that given to it by the apostle Paul. 

We can now understand this saying of a distinguished 
theologian: "There is but a step between any text of Scrip- 
ture and the cross on which the Savior died." 

The high place assigned to the death of Christ in the Scrip- 
tures is proof positive that his death has a meaning definite, 
unique, sublime, divine. Could there be found a man with 
mind and soul so dead that he is not profoundly interested 
in what that meaning is? 

To whom shall we turn for an answer to our question? To 



FRANK M. DOWLING 221 

men? Men did not originate the scheme of redemption. How- 
ever much men may discover by their reasoning and philoso- 
phizing, do we not feel that the secret of the meaning of 
Christ's death belongs to God? The great question is, has 
God revealed his secret? Paul's faith was that God, having 
of old time spoken unto the fathers in the prophets by divers 
portions and in divers manners, hath at the end of these days 
spoken unto us in his Son. 

Friends, with me, whatever Christ says, by his own lips or 
through those whom he chose and qualified to speak for him, 
has come to be final. The life he lived, the teaching he gave, 
the signs he wrought, the resurrection he attained, the influ- 
ence he exerted and still exerts, establish the divine claims he 
made and justify our reason when we make his word the end 
of controversy. What then do Christ and the chosen ones say 
concerning the meaning of his death? 

Listen ! 0, man, listen ! In the hour in which Jesus was be- 
trayed, in the upper room, at the last supper with the dis- 
ciples, he took bread, and blessed and brake it ; and he gave to 
the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body. And he 
took the cup, . and gave thanks, and gave to them, saying, 
Drink ye all of it; for this is my blood of the new covenant, 
which is shed for many unto remission of sins. 

Hear him, once more. After his resurrection, perhaps at 
his last meeting with the disciples, he uttered these great 
words: "Thus it is written and thus it behooved Christ to 
suffer and rise again from the dead the third day that repent- 
ance and remission of sins should be preached in his name." 
And, friends, nothing is more certain than that the disciples, 
who at first were offended and dismayed at the thought of 
Christ's death, afterwards received from Christ and accepted 
his explanation of the meaning of his death. 

The apostle Peter was the most shocked at the thought of a 
crucified Savior. But he came to understand it, and then he 
wrote: "Ye were redeemed, not with corruptible things, with 
silver or gold, but with precious blood, as of a lamb without 
blemish and without spot, even the blood of Christ." I recall 



222 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

also another glorious utterance of Peter: " Christ also suffered 
for sins once, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might 
bring us to God." 

John has been called the theologian and the divine among the 
apostles, he alone of all the apostles witnessed the crucifixion. 
No doubt he was as deeply bewildered as the rest. How did he 
come to view the death of Christ? What a glorious ascription 
of praise burst from his heart in the midst of the revelation 
that came to him on lonely Patmos. "Unto Him that loved us 
and washed us from our sins in His blood; and made us to be a 
kingdom, to be priests unto His God and Father; to Him be 
the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen!" 

As the wondrous vision of the Apocalypse passed before his 
eyes he beheld certain ones before the throne and he heard 
them singing this new song: "Worthy art Thou to take the 
book, and to open the seals thereof, for Thou wast slain, and 
didst purchase unto God with Thy blood men of every tribe, 
and tongue, and people, and nation and madest them to be 
unto our God a kingdom and priests." 

Then he beheld beautiful ones arrayed in white robes, and 
learned that these were they who came out of the great tribula- 
tion, and washed their robes and made them white in the blood 
of the Lamb. 

Paul is looked upon as the logician and the philosopher of 
the apostles. It is not too much to say that Paul's gospel was 
that Christ died for our sins; and he calls down a curse upon 
man or angel who would preach any other gospel. 

The great question with Paul was, How can God be just and 
a justifier of the sinner? His answer is found in these words: 
"Being justified freely by this grace through redemption that 
is in Christ Jesus, through faith, by his blood." 

Another question upon which Paul's mind brooded was, 
"How can sinful men get right with God?" His answer was: 
"Him who knew no sin He made to be sin on our behalf that 
we might become the righteousness of God in Him." 

The great-souled Paul trembled at the thought of a man's 
dying in his sins and standing in the judgment condemned; 



FRANK M. DOWLING 223 

and so his glorious message was "Inasmuch as it is appointed 
unto men once to die, and after this cometh judgment, so 
Christ having been once offered to bear the sins of many, shall 
appear a second time, apart from sin, to them that wait for 
Him unto salvation." 

But at this point I imagine that someone says: "I know it is 
the teaching of Christ and his apostles that Christ died for our 
sins, but I cannot understand it; I want something that ap- 
peals to my reason. ' ' Well, my friend, is there anything more 
reasonable than that there should be some things — many things 
in God's plan of salvation that transcend human reason? 
Would it not be the perfection of unreason to allow God to have 
no mysteries which he does not, and which he could not, make 
known unto us? Have we no place in our thinking for Paul's 
exclamation: "0 the depth of the riches both of the wisdom 
and the knowledge of God, how unsearchable are his judg- 
ments, and his ways past tracing out. For who hath known 
the mind of our Lord? or who hath been his counsellor?" 0, 
my brother, ought not we who are surrounded on all sides and 
oppressed by the mysteries of nature have a place in our think- 
ing for mysteries of grace ? 

Notwithstanding all this, I am sure our poor human reason 
can find justification in God's solution of the problem of the 
world's sin through the death of his Son. To begin with, it is 
reasonable that God should take some account of human sin. 
There are other intelligences in the universe besides man. For 
God to have taken no notice of sin would have caused amaze- 
ment and encouraged rebellion among all orders of intelligent 
beings. His moral rulership in the universe would have been 
at an end. How do you knoAv that there was any better way for 
God to give an exhibition of his view of the exceeding sinful- 
ness of sin, and his great desire for the salvation of the sinner 
than was made in the death of Christ? How does it come that 
you are prepared to deny that in the death of Christ sin re- 
ceived such treatment as to enable God in the sight of all 
created intelligences to treat sinners as he could not otherwise 
have done consistently with his righteous characters. Your first 



224 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

thought is that sin must be punished, but how do you know that 
God could not accomplish the gracious ends of punishment by 
substituting another course of action involving the death of his 
Son? One thing is certain, if God should punish a sinner it 
would be to accomplish his reformation and salvation; and 
another thing is equally certain, there has appeared no force 
in human history for reforming and saving sinful men at all to 
be Compared with the ' ' Word of the Cross. ' ' 

Brother, will it satisfy your reason to judge God's method of 
saving the world through the death of his Son by the rule 
which Christ himself proposed — "by their fruits ye shall know 
them'?" If so, the question of the death of Christ for the sins 
of men resolves itself into this: Has the death of Christ for 
sin borne good fruit in the lives of men? If not, it was need- 
less and useless; if so, it is the wisdom of God and the power 
of God. 

From the New Testament point of view cross-less preaching 
is not only Christless preaching, it is powerless preaching. It 
may please the fancy, and the emotions, and the imagination; 
it may inform the mind on many important subjects, and hold 
up beautiful ideals for imitation; but this thing it can never 
do — it cannot quicken the conscience, cleanse the heart, and 
move the will. Who are the men who have convinced the 
world in respect of sin, or righteousness, and of judgment? 
Who are the men who have turned men from darkness into 
light, from the power of Satan unto God, that they might have 
remission of sins and an inheritance among them who are sancti- 
fied? Who are the men who have induced men to renounce 
their sins and seek after holiness without which no man can 
see God? Who are the men who have added hundreds and 
thousands to the multitude of the saved? Who are the men 
who have gone to the uttermost parts of the earth where men 
sit in darkness and the shadow of death, and have persuaded 
them and enabled them to renounce the hidden works of dark- 
ness and turn from the worship of dumb idols to serve the 
living God? 

Call the roll of their names, and see if they have not been 



FRANK M. DOWLING 225 

men who were determined to know nothing among men save 
Jesus Christ and him crucified. They are the men who have 
believed that a fountain was opened in Judah, wherein scarlet 
and crimson sins can be washed and made like snow and like 
wool. For themselves these men have said: 

"My sins I bring to Thee, 
The sins I cannot count, 
That they might cleansed be, 
In Thy once opened fount." 

And when they had been washed, cleansed, sanctified in the 
name of Jesus Christ and by the spirit of God, they were filled 
with a passion for souls, and having felt and yielded to the at- 
tractive power of the cross they felt and yielded to the expul- 
sive power of the cross, and went up and down the world point- 
ing men to the Lamb of God who taketh away the sin of the 
world. One of these men exclaimed: " Others may tell the hor- 
rors of hell and the glories of heaven, but give me the story of 
the cross. The cross is the lever for lifting humanity up to 
God." 

Principal Fairbairn is right: "The cross has in a perfectly 
real sense done more than any other agency to convict the 
world in sin; one may say it has created in man, both as person 
and as race, the conscience for sin." 

Professor Denney goes so far as to say: "The propitiatory 
death of Christ, as an all-transcending demonstration of love, 
evokes in sinful souls a response which is the whole of Chris- 
tianity. There is nothing which is so urgently and immediately 
wanted by sinful men, nothing which strikes so deep into the 
heart, which answers so completely to its need, and binds it so 
irrevocably and with such a sense of obligation to God, as the 
atoning death of Jesus." I have somewhere seen this expres- 
sion, "the annihilative and creative power of the cross." If 
the cross has such a power, and has it to a sufficient degree, it 
is the only power requisite to work all the changes in human 
character that God desires. The matter of soul culture is a 
double process, it consists on the one hand of annihilating cer- 
tain thoughts and tendencies, and practices, and on the other 



226 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

hand, creating new thoughts and new tendencies and new 
practices. Paul calls this process putting off the old man and 
putting on the new. The claim is that the cross is the power to 
accomplish all this. 

In its New Testament sense repentance covers the entire ex- 
perience of getting right with God, and it is undeniably true 
that repentance is born at the cross. Deny this and myriads of 
voices would be raised to bear witness to the truth. My sinning 
brother, if you have never repented of your sins, of one thing 
I am certain, you have never had a vision of the cross. The 
cross may be held before you this morning and your eyes may 
be holden that you may not see it, but, if you do see it, from the 
depths of your soul you will cry, "Lord, remember me when 
thou comest into thy kingdom." If Jesus bore my sins in his 
body on the tree; if he who knew no sin, was made sin for me; 
if my sin added the least part to his agony in Gethsemane, and 
to his suffering on Calvary ; if he was wounded for my iniqui- 
ties ; if he was bruised for my transgressions ; if the chastise- 
ment of my peace was upon him, and if by his stripes I am 
healed ; if my sin betrayed him ; if my sin scourged him ; if my 
sin drove the nails in his hands and feet; if my sin plunged 
the spear in his side, who am I, what am I, if I do not hate and 
loathe my sins; if I do not renounce my sins; if my bruised, 
broken spirit does not cry: "God, be merciful to me, a sinner?" 

It seems that Paul could not think of repentance without con- 
necting it with the cross of Christ. With him a vision of the 
cross lays upon sinful man the obligation to crucify the flesh. 
He surely felt that, if Christ was crucified for our sins, we 
ought to crucify our sins for Christ's sake. The apostle knew 
that the cross furnished the motive not only for the first 
renunciation of sin, but also for the lifelong struggle and the 
final, complete triumph. Hear him saying: "God forbid that 
I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
through which I am crucified unto the world, and the world 
unto me." The secret of Paul's life is to be found in the 
cross. He says: "I am crucified with Christ nevertheless I 
live — yet not I but Christ lives in me, for the life which I 



FRANK M. DOWLING 227 

now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who 
loved me and gave himself for me. ' ' Have you ever wondered 
where Panl got his inspiration and strength for his life of 
abundant and heroic and sacrificial service ? He tells you. ' ' The 
love of Christ constraineth us for we thus judge that if one 
died for all then were all dead, and that he died for all that 
they who live should not live henceforth for themselves; but 
for Him who died for them. ' ' 

A little thought will enable us to understand this ''appeal of 
the cross." 

It is an appeal to our capacity for gratitude. I think Pro- 
fessor Denney is right when he says: ''I do not hesitate to say 
that the sense of debt to Christ is the most profound and per- 
vasive of all emotions in the New Testament, ' ' and I think he is 
right when he goes on to show that the death of Christ for us 
is the power ordained of God to arouse this emotion within us. 
If Christ died for us we owe everything to him. 

Then the appeal of the cross is an appeal to our capacity to 
love. Nothing begets love like love. We all know how a pure, 
and especially a suffering human love awakens an answering 
love in our hearts. How beautiful and true is the utterance of 
Scripture, "We love Him because He first loved us!" The 
appeal of love is the most irresistible appeal that can be made 
to the human heart. God knows all about this. 0, my friends, 
you have not learned the first thing about the death of Christ 
if you have not learned that it is the supreme exhibition of the 
love of God. "God so loved the world that he gave his only 
begotten Son." Hear it, oh, man, and believe and be born 
again. 

Let Paul be your preacher and say unto you: "The love of 
God commendeth itself unto us that while we were yet sinners 
Christ died for us." My brother, if you will draw nigh unto 
the cross of Christ and stand gazing there with an open soul, 
that once accursed, but now glorified, tree will break into speech 
and into your heart will fall these words of the Infinite God — 
"I love you." And, terrible the words, if your cold, dead 
heart warms with no responsive love, you have resisted heaven's 



228 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

supreme and final appeal, and j r ou are cut off from God for- 
ever since even God has no further appeal. 

The man who uttered the words I am about to quote seems 
to have had a divine insight into the meaning of the cross, 
' ' The cross is the temporal display of God 's eternal heartache ; 
the disclosure of the pains to which the Father will go to save 
his helpless, erring children; the final and consummate act in 
the life of our Lord in which his suffering heart of mercy and 
love becomes clearly unveiled to the world. It is the appeal 
that heaven makes to earth, that divinity makes to humanity." 

"Holy, holy, holy cross 
All else won I count but loss, 
Sapphire suns are dust and dross 
In the radiance of the Face 
Which reveals God's way of grace- 
Open to a rebel race. 

"Bansom He and ransomed we, 
Love and justice here agree; 
Let the angels bend and see 
Endless is this mystery; 
He, the Judge, our pardon wins, • 
In His wounds our peace begins. 

"Looking on the accursed tree, 
When we God as Savior see, 
Him as Lord we gladly choose, 
Him as King cannot refuse, 
Love of sin with guilt we lose, 
So the cross the soul renews, 

"In His righteousness we hide 
Last, long woe of guilt and pride; 
In His spirit we abide, 
Naught are we, our all is He; 
Christ's pierced hands have set us free; 
Grace is his beyond degree. 

"Glory His about all height, 
Mercy, majesty and might, 
God in man is love's delight; 
Man in God of God hath sight; 
Day in God hath never night ; 
Love is God's throne great and white." 



W. F. RICHARDSON 

WF. RICHARDSON was born in Columbus, Adams County, Illinois, 
• June 30, 1852. His father, Aaron Kichardson, was a native of Floyd 
County, Indiana, but his ancestors were Virginians. His mother, Mary 
Nance, was likewise born in Floyd County, Ind., her paternal grandfather, 
Clement Nance, being a preacher of the gospel and a co-laborer with Bar- 
ton W. Stone. With Mr. Stone and many of his fellow-workers, Mr. Nance 
came into the current reformation, and was a faithful minister in its fel- 
lowship until the time of his death. 

W. F.'s parents moved to McLean County, 111., when he was an infant, 
and his father died at Bloomington in 1854, leaving five children, of whom 
W. F. was the youngest. Two years later his mother moved with her lit- 
tle family to Eureka, 111. In its "district school' ' he received his early 
education. 

In the fall of 1872 he entered Eureka College, and completed the four 
years classical course, graduating in 1876. Three years later he received 
from the college the degree of A.M., and in 1898 the degree of LL.D. from 
Drake University. 

His first settled pastorate was at Pontiac, 111., where he had preached 
during the last year and a half of his college course, and where he re- 
mained for nearly three years after graduation. His second pastorate was 
in Assumption, 111. He was just entering upon his third year with that 
church when in 1881 he suffered a stroke of paralysis in his vocal chords, 
wbich disabled him from preaching for more than three years. During this 
time he lived in Denver, Colo., engaging in secular business for a livelihood. 

On the restoration of his voice, he was called to the Lyon Street church 
of Christ in Grand Rapids, Mich., in the fall of 1884. During his pas- 
torate there, the church built its first house of worship, having held its serv- 
ices before in a rented room. During his residence in Grand Rapidsi he was 
president of the State Missionary Board during all the time, except a few 
months at the beginning. 

January 1, 1890, he accepted a call to the First church in Allegheny, 
Pa., now the North Side of Pittsburgh. At the close of his second year, 
throat trouble again developed, which compelled him to resign and seek a 
more favorable climate. Called to the pastorate of the Central Christian 
church, in Denver, Colo., he served for about two years and a half, at which 
time he was called to succeed Brother T. P. Haley in the First Christian 
church of Kansas City. Ho was in this pastorate from October 1, 1894 to 
1917. 

.229 



230 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

In May, 1877, he was married to Leora Emerson, daughter of Judge 
Chas. Emerson, of Decatur, 111. His wife was a graduate of Eureka Col- 
lege in the same class with himself. She died Dec. 19, 1909. Five children 
were born into their home, three of whom are still living. 

During his pastorate in Allegheny he was a member of the State Mis- 
sionary Board of Western Pennsylvania. In Denver he served as president 
of the State Board of Colorado, and in Missouri gave the same service to 
the Missouri Christian Missionary Society for many years. He was also 
president of the General Convention of Churches of Christ in 1916. 

Perhaps the best work Dr. Richardson has done is that of his long pas- 
torate at the Central church in Kansas City. For several years that church 
had to struggle with the problem of a shifting downtown population. But 
the pastor remained at his post, and in the face of many discouragements 
the church continued to prosper. Finally the old church building was de 
stroyed by fire. This precipitated a crisis which would have wholly discour- 
aged anyone less resolute than the distinguished leader. But he at once 
began to plan for a new building, much better suited for a downtown 
church than the one that was destroyed. He stayed by the work until tht 
new building was completed, and then in 1916 resigned his pastorate, fol- 
lowing what seems to be almost a common habit among preachers; viz., to 
build a new church edifice, and leave it soon after it is finished. After a 
short period of rest he accepted a call to the church at Hollywood, Cali- 
fornia, His leaving Kansas City was a distinct loss to the cause at that 
place. 

The foregoing facts are sufficient to show that Dr. Richardson has led 
a very active life ; and though he has passed the prime, he is still as vigorous 
and as active as ever. 

Dr. Richardson's sermons are mainly of an expository and practical char- 
acter. He has little or no use for the sensational, relying chiefly upon the 
Holy Scriptures to tell their own story and the simple gospel message to 
produce its own result. Outside the pulpit he has done distinguished service 
for the cause of Christ. Wherever he has held positions of trust, he has 
been not only faithful but has shown excellent judgment in management. He 
is not only an excellent pastor, but is a wise Christian statesman. 




Sincerely your brother, 



M, 




A LOST ART 

By W. F. Richardson 

Text. — "They that were scattered abroad went about preaching 
the word." — Acts 8:4. 

ONE of the most noteworthy lectures of the past century 
was that of the eloquent Wendell Phillips on "The Lost 
Arts." In it he most effectively rebuked the conceit of our 
modern age in deeming itself the source and repository of the 
world's useful knowledge. Like Coleridge's German at Frank- 
fort, who always took off his hat when he spoke of himself, 
our age holds itself in such esteem as to deserve this criticism. 
Mr. Phillips showed by a reference to ancient history that not 
only was the art of early times still the despair of the modern 
world, and its literature of such high quality as to furnish a 
model to modern orators and writers, but that much of our 
present science is but an amplifying of the scientific attain- 
ments of bygone ages. Glass was commonly known among the 
ancients; steam was discovered ages ago, though never uti- 
lized; while the existence of electricity was discovered in the 
age of Thales. The amusements by which our youth are en- 
tertained had their origin near the dawn of history, and, most 
cruel of all, Mr. Phillips assures us that our modern stories, 
which we attribute to the Irish and Hebrew races, were nar- 
rated many centuries ago in the streets of Grecian towns and 
cities. 

There is one lost art, once practiced diligently in the Church 
of God, which needs to be revived. In this era of organizations, 
institutions, societies, committees, the art referred to in our 
text — that of religious conversation, of private preaching, of 
personal evangelism — has become well nigh a lost art. Men 
depend upon church and society organizations to reach the 

231 



232 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

masses, forgetting that the masses are but aggregations of 
individuals. 

This personal evangelism was the favored method of our 
Lord in disseminating the truth. His first disciples were drawn 
to him one by one as he sat with them in the house, or talked 
with them by the way. Calling Simon Peter and Andrew and 
the sons of Zebedee from their nets and Matthew from his col- 
lector's stall, are but typical of his way of enlisting men in his 
service. He preached sermons to the crowd, and wonderful 
they were too, but very much of his noblest teaching was in 
personal conversation. With the woman beside Jacob's well, 
he talked of the highest themes that concerned holiness, sin 
and God. In the home of Zaccheus he so eloquently told the 
story of divine love as to win the heart of that self-satisfied 
publican to a life of sacrifice and brotherhood. 

After his resurrection, he revealed himself not to the multi- 
tude, but to Mary Magdalene, to Peter and James and the 
eleven, and the two disciples at Emmaus. He was content to 
impress the fact of his resurrection upon the hearts of such in- 
dividuals as might become evangels to the world of the new 
hope. His disciples were wise enough to follow his example. 
At the house of Cornelius in Caesarea, Peter gave a discourse 
scarcely inferior to his noble penteeostal sermon. To Lydia 
and the little group of women at the riverside at Philippi and 
to the jailer in his own home within the city walls, Paul and 
Silas gave as eagerly the gospel message as they ever preached 
it to the throng. Nor was this personal evangelism confined to 
the apostolic messengers. Aquila and Priscilla, hearing the 
eloquent Apollos at Ephesus, recognized the incompleteness 
of his message, and sitting down with him in private converse 
" showed him the way of the Lord more perfectly." 

In the early Church, every disciple became himself a teacher. 
Everyone was saved to serve. The story that had proven sweet 
and satisfying to his heart he could not keep to himself. Hence, 
the scattering of the Church throughout the Roman empire 
meant not the destruction, but the disseminating of the gospel. 
Whether by word or deed, whether by life or death, each fol- 



W. F. RICHARDSON 233 

lower of Christ witnessed for his Master with such effect as to 
leaven the life of all the nations with the truth of God. This 
fact furnishes the secret of the gospel's wonderful progress. 
Every Christian became a vessel to convey the water of life to 
others ; a channel, through which the stream of life flowed out 
into every corner of human society. 

This is God's law for propagating truth. Not even the send- 
ing of the Bible for men to read, not even the building of 
churches to which they may be invited for worship, not even 
the supporting of ministers to whose sermons they are asked 
to listen, can bring the world to the feet of Jesus Christ. "The 
gospel needs a voice — a book will not do ; behind the Bible 
must be a believer, behind the gospel, a gospeller or herald. 
.... It is God's plan that believers shall be everywhere scat- 
tered in order to provide avenues of spiritual communication. ' ' 
For the gospel is not epidemic, spreading through the air, light- 
ing in unexpected places without visible cause. It is conta- 
gious, and goes from soul to soul — from heart to heart. We 
catch it from one another by personal spiritual contact. This 
was the secret of the growth of early Methodism. Wesley's 
motto was: "Tell the man next to you;" and because his fol- 
lowers were burning with evangelistic zeal, his ministry was 
duplicated in ten thousand places, through ten thousand con- 
secrated lives. 

This was also the secret of the early growth of the Disciples 
of Christ. It was the rule for each disciple to carry in his 
pocket the New Testament, and to draw that spiritual weapon 
for self defense, or for attack upon the stronghold of error. 
We sadly need to restore this personal evangelism. We need 
it not only that the world may be converted, but that we may 
not make a mockery of our own lives. It is a well known prin- 
ciple in psychology that any emotion, to be effective in form- 
ing character, must be embodied in act, Maudlin pity for the 
unfortunate without actual ministry to their needs, is worse 
than useless — it is absolutely hurtful. To shed tears over the 
imaginary sorrows portrayed upon the stage or in the novel, and 
shut the eyes to the suffering in the hovel around the corner of 



234 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

the street, is to degrade every faculty of sympathy into a means 
of self-indulgence. From multitudes of hearts, bitter with 
remorse and overwhelmed with despair, comes the cry: "No 
man careth for my soul. ' ' The Church of God might make this 
cry impossible, if every member became a messenger of the 
Lord. Each lost soul is not only "somebody's child," but is a 
child of our heavenly Father, and is therefore to us most closely 
akin. We are but seeking to save our own when we are reach- 
ing out the hand of help to any one who is lost. 

The neglect of this art by the Church has led to a popular 
contempt for both the Church and its ministry, which finds 
expression in references to the Church as "a social club" and 
to the preacher as a "sky pilot," who has to do, like the pilot 
at the port, with the beginning and the ending of life's journey, 
but who is made no account of during its long progress. Nor 
has the ministry been free from blame in bringing about this 
condition. An eminent canon of the English church, making an 
appeal some years ago on Hospital Sunday for the institution 
of a celibate priesthood in the Church, used these words: "A 
sick man wants consolation administered to him by a soft- 
handed priest, and not by some callous-fingered mechanic or 
some one burdened with domestic or mercantile cares." And 
this within gunshot of White Chapel district, in the very neigh- 
borhood where the Salvation Army is doing its Christ-like 
work for the hopeless and outcast of that great city ! The truth 
is, that the "soft-handed priest" is often powerless to admin- 
ister either comfort or the strength required by the unfor- 
tunate, when some humble follower of Jesus Christ, unlettered 
but not untaught of God, can in simplest words and with truest 
sympathy prove a brother to him. In fact, the Lord would 
have the miracle of the incarnation perpetuated in his Church 
by making every believer a "living epistle known and read of 
all men. ' ' 

We have four gospels in the Bible, which we designate "the 
gospel according to Matthew, according to Mark, according to 
Luke and according to John. ' ' What is needed to make these 
gospels most effective in the world, is to embody their message 



W. F. RICHARDSON 235 

in your life and mine, so that men shall read ' ' the gospel accord- 
ing to John, or Sarah, or Samuel, or Mary" — thus only will the 
mission of Jesus finally prevail in the world. 

For such personal evangelism there is daily and hourly op- 
portunity. The preacher can preach only on occasions. The 
personal witness can testify all the time. And men are need- 
ing this testimony constantly. In the words of Henry Ward 
Beecher: "As ships meet at sea — a moment together, when 
words of greeting must be spoken, and then away into the 
deep — so men meet in this world; and I think we should cross 
no man's path without hailing him, and if he needs, giving him 
supplies. ' ' 

Should Christian men in business life practice this personal 
evangelism, there would be no excuse for the present charge 
that there is ' ' atheism in business. " " If in all men did, they were 
doing it in the name of Jesus Christ, their very daily pursuit 
would be their daily preaching. For Christ is not "The King 
of Sunday ' ' — all the days are his. It is useless for the business 
man, who calls himself a Christian, to practice for six days 
in the week a business with no religion in it, and then expect to 
charm men on the seventh day by a religion with no business 
in it. 

Here is one danger in our modern evangelistic methods. We 
are so zealous in counting members, so eager to save a multi- 
tude, that we are in danger of touching the surface of the 
spiritual life of the multitude without penetrating to the very 
heart of the individual. 

"I am the light of the world," said the Master. "He that 
followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the 
light of life." But light must have objects to reflect it or it 
cannot illumine. Even the light of the sun, we are assured, 
could not illumine the eyes of men, were it not for the atmos- 
phere through which it passes, laden with its invisible sub- 
stances, which are but myriads of tiny mirrors reflecting the 
glory of the god of day. So the Master has taught us that we 
are the light of the world, and that our light is so to shine that 
it may bring others to desire and seek the face of God. Now 



236 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

light is not to be looked at, but to be lived by. The traveler 
does not gaze at the sun, but he walks safely in its light, The 
miner carries his lamp upon his forehead, where it throws light 
upon his dark task. The light of God 's grace and truth should 
be carried in our faces so effectively that while we ourselves 
may be unconscious of its shining, others shall be able to walk 
in its light. And the brighter our light shines, the less disposed 
will men be to look at us, and the more certain and gladly will 
they follow in the path we brighten. 

What joy comes to the heart through the faithful pursuit of 
this lost art of personal evangelism! To know that one has 
saved a soul from death and covered a multitude of sins ; to be 
conscious that one has enlisted another soul for the kingdom of 
God; to be assured that the song of redemption is echoing 
through another soul who has learned its strains from us — 
this is to have the supreme joy that can visit the human heart. 
The joy of Christ came from his successful ministry in saving 
men. "He shall see of the travail of his soul and be satisfied " 
said the ancient prophet. We share in "the joy of the Lord," 
when we share in his saving ministry. 

Nor need the least of the Master's followers despise his own 
gifts in this direction. No soul is so weak, no life so small 
that it cannot serve God's purpose of grace if dedicated to his 
service. A little lad was waiting on a great artist, watching 
day by day his marvelous designs wrought in mosaics, and 
wishing that he too might make some beautiful picture or some 
graceful design, but the artist would not trust the precious 
material to his untrained hands. One day the little lad found 
a pile of rubbish lying outside the door, in which were embodied 
many tiny bits of glass thrown aside by the master in his work. 
Picking these out and carefully cleaning them, the little fellow 
carried them to his garret room, and between the hours of 
labor wrought patiently with them until he had designed a 
tiny window, and timidly brought it to the great artist. The 
little window revealed to the master mind the real artistic soul 
that was in the little lad, and from that day, he encouraged 
and guided him until he in turn became a master of his art. 



W. P. RICHARDSON 237 

So God can take the tiny bits of wisdom, skill and knowledge 
that are ours, and help us to work them up into little windows 
through which something of the light of God may shine into 
other hearts. For "He who unites grains of sand for making 
planets, and rays of light for glorious suns, and blades of grass 
for the solid splendor of field and pasture, and drops of water 
for the ocean that blesses every continent with its dew and rain, 
teaches us also that great principles will organize the little 
words, little prayers, little aspirations and little services in the 
full-orbed splendor of an enduring character and an immortal 
fame." Bring then thy gift to the Lord, and use it for the 
souls about you, with faith and fervor ; for He who could use 
the acacia rod in Moses' hand to deliver Israel from Egypt 
and open the passage through the Red Sea; who could use the 
sling in the hand of the shepherd lad to fell the giant Goliath 
upon the earth ; who could multiply the loaves and fishes from the 
little boy's basket till He fed the hungry multitude; who could 
give to the world an inspiring message of generosity through 
the two mites that fell from the widow's hand into the treasure 
box at the Temple door; who could pronounce such blessing 
upon the broken vase of fragrant ointment as to make its per- 
fume felt down the ages, and make sweet a myriad of lives of 
like self-sacrifice; who could so glorify the needle of Dorcas, as 
she made the garments for the poor, as to set in motion ten 
thousand times ten thousand Christian women's hands in min- 
istries of like mercy to the needy ; can use what little gifts we 
possess and make them gloriously effective. 

Take then thy message to the needy world; delay not thy 
steps in carrying the gospel to thy neighbor, thy friend, or the 
stranger whom thou meetest on the highway. God has given 
to you this precious gift. Use it loyally and eagerly, and he will 
recompense thee and make thy labors abundant in fruit. As 
the little child digs his tiny well in the sea shore's sand, and the 
tides of the great ocean come creeping in through the sands to 
fill it, so let us dig our little wells of loving service, of eager 
testimony, and God 's great ocean of love and grace will flow in 
and fill them with that sweet water of life from which a dying 
world shall freelv drink. 



WILLIAM EDGAR CRABTREE 

TT71LLIAM EDGAR CRABTREE was born at Madisonville, Kentucky. 
» » August 10, 1868. His father, Cyrus W. Crabtree was a zealous elder 
of Manitou Christian church at time of his death in 1886. His mother was 
Ermina Rebecca Gregory, daughter of Virginians, and on the maternal side 
he is the third generation of Disciples. The mother, a woman of rare 
Christian faith and life, dedicated her children early to Christian service 
and at the time of her death in 1912 had four members of her immediate 
household serving in California pulpits. 

Edgar, at age of ten, went with his' father 's large family to a farm and 
for several years did all kinds of farm work, from clearing away forest 
to harvesting crops. The values of this experience are today manifest. With 
other members of the family, he attended private schools until he was six- 
teen, at which time he entered the Standard Normal School at Madisonville 
and in the second term graduated, securing a teacher's state diploma. For 
three terms he taught in the common schools, and has ever counted that his 
life as a young schoolmaster made a distinct contribution to his subsequent 
ministry. He taught a mining town school. There was no church near the 
paternal farm, and he and his twin brother went horseback double to Mad- 
isonville, six miles away. 

Then the zealous mother gathered the neighborhood children into a Sun- 
day school. Custom in those days did not allow women to offer public 
prayer, so if ''Uncle Dave Davis" did not appear, there was no prayer. 
However, the mother taught the lesson and there was singing. When her 
first four children, including Edgar, made confession, it was not in a church, 
but in a tobacco factory, to which the revival was carried from an over- 
flowing schoolhouse. Dr. D. M. Breaker was the evangelist. A church 
was built at nearby Manitou and the children became active in Sunday 
school and prayer meeting. Having decided to enter the ministry, Edgar 
matriculated in College of the Bible, Lexington, in 1888. Here his teachers 
were Graham, McGarvey, Grubbs, Loos, White, Milligan, Fairhurst, Collis, 
Freeman and Ellett. To these men, who during a period of five years guided 
his training he feels his debt is incalculable. Besides what they taught, in 
themselves they mightily influenced his life. He graduated in College of the 
Bible in 1891 as valedictorian of his class, and in 1893 he finished the 
classic course of Kentucky University in the honor group. He preached his 
first sermon in old Republican church near Lexington, the church whose pic- 
ture is displayed in James Lane Allen 's book, ' ' The Reign of Law. ' ' Dur- 
ing college days he served as minister to the following churches, all in 
Kentucky: Glencoe, Mt. Carmel, Moorefield and Carlisle. In January, 189X 



240 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

he was called to Chestnut Street Christian church, Lexington, and after 
graduation in June devoted himself to that field, expecting to make it his 
life work, but his field in the far West was definitely marked out for him. 

In October, 1893, he married Miss Ettie Goode, of Bowling Green, Ken- 
tucky, who has been a true and co-operating friend in his ministry. Since 
going to San Diego, California, two daughters, Rebekah and Harriet, now 
young ladies in college life, were born to them. 

Mr. Crabtree preached his first sermon in Central church, San Diego, on 
July 15, 1895. A congregation of 125 in a small frame building located 
some distance from the heart of the city, greeted him and entered heartily 
into work with him. It was San Diego's dull day and church work was 
heroic at that time. The summer of 1917 completed the twenty-second year 
of his ministry with this church. The city has grown and the church has 
grown with it. Today the membership is a thousand and worships in a hand- 
some $75,000 property, modern in equipment, and filled with busy workers 
nearly every day of the week. Out from Central Christian, three other 
churches have gone and Central has turned over to them property free of 
debt in every case. For nine years this church has been in the "Living 
Link" column and including the Woman's Missionary Society supports two 
Living Links on the foreign field. Of course, it is active in the home field. 

Mr. Crabtree is oldest in point of service, of all ministers, Catholic and 
Protestant, in San Diego, and his enlarged constituency calls for much 
outside ministry. He conducts from eighty to one hundred funeral services 
a year and married in 1913, which was his banner year in that respect, 210 
couples. He has served his city and county on various commissions, such as 
Library and Probation, and enters heartily in all civic, betterment and re- 
form work. At one time, the Congressman, Legislator, Mayor, Chief of 
Police and President of City Board of Education were all members of Cen- 
tral Christian. This minister is never happier than when free to "preach 
the Word" and "to exhort from house to house." He has sought by pri- 
vate study and by travel, including a sojourn in Bible lands, to keep abreast 
and efficient. He is a thoroughgoing Calif ornian and has for his ambition 
the development of a group of self-supporting churches in San Diego and 
environs before he relinquishes the active guidance to another. 

The foregoing record is sufficient to give the subject the right to a 
place among the representatives of the New Living Pulpit of the Disciples 
of Christ. Mr. Crabtree is perhaps the best known and most popular 
preacher in the city where he lives. Blest with a striking personality, he 
is endowed also with those mental qualities which combine to make him 
the successful pastor that he is. It is well for the Christian Church that 
they have such an able and faithful representative in the growing and im- 
portant city of San Diego. In his hands the gospel is always safe, that 
makes safe the salvation of souls. 



TRUE APOSTOLIC SUCCESSION 

By W. E. Crabtree 

Text. — "And the things which thou hast heard from me among 
many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who 
shall be able to teach others also." — 2 Tim. 2:2. 
"More truth shall break out of thy word." 

I BELIEVE God led in the discoveries of truth made by the 
Campbells and their compeers. They spoke, as all useful 
men have ever done, to their age and in the terms and spirit 
of their day. If we are true children, we will not covet their 
accoutrement nor fight in their style. We shall be preachers 
of the truth to our own age as it is. The truth they preached, 
because it is truth, will go marching on. I call to your mind 
the battle cry of theirs, "Back to Christ," and the noble con- 
tention that what is not as old as the New Testament in spir- 
itual authority, is not old enough. That back of the ranks of 
illustrious church authorities stands He who only has the right 
to speak to conscience. In this address I wish to show how 
apposite that truth is to our day. And another clear note they 
sounded was that "Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by 
the word of Christ." They often quoted, "How shall they 
hear without a preacher," and it was "God's good pleasure 
through the foolishness of the preaching to save them that 
believe." They were themselves the illustration that not by 
proxy in any way, nor picture, nor printed page should the 
heart of the sinner be touched, but by the hearing of the 
animated speaker, the human voice vibrant with faith and 
love; not by the superstitious nor mystical way but by a soul 
with love divine facing a soul to be won, pouring out a testi- 
mony to grace's power. Thus 'tis done, the great transaction's 
done. Still another insistence in their teaching was the priest- 
hood of believers. No mediator is allowed but the one medi- 

241 



242 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

ator, himself man, Christ Jesus. Scant reverence theirs for 
church orders and dignitaries and the voice and vote of every 
fellow-member were encouraged and registered. Independence 
in congregational fellowship and a big individualism in the 
life of each congregation, this was the recognition. The 
church a company of equals, a spiritual democracy. Enos 
Campbell said to me once, " Young man, the church of Christ 
cannot be destroyed, for its head is in heaven, where they 
cannot reach him with impious hands, and if only one true 
Disciple were His on earth, there is his body alive.' ' Indi- 
vidualistic but comforting is this sentiment. 

Personality is the biggest factor in Christian thought and 
activity today, and this is why Jesus Christ is more regnant 
now than ever he has been. A thousand voices are shouting, 
"Back to Christ," in the enthusiasm of a new spiritual dis- 
covery and the consciousness of a truth that satisfies the heart 
for aye. I knew a day when written creeds might be com- 
pared to girded trees in a deadening, breaking the silence by 
their rapid falling. Today in the midst of the open field stands 
a solitary tree of life. Jesus in his Kingship and Lordship is 
the universal and unrivaled creed, the one object of faith, and 
is accepted into the life more like to the silent rising of the 
tree sap, than by the compelling process of inflexible logic. 
They asked, "What work doest thou that we may believe?" 
He said, "This is the work of God, that ye believe on him 
whom he hath sent;" and Paul had no better way of stating 
in old age the faith that guided him through life-long service 
than to say, "I know whom I have believed." There is no 
apologetic like Christ, the fact of Christ, the living Christ to 
our people, hungry of soul and restless. 

He is the Person of the world. A great American preacher, 
who went away from vital faith for twenty years, has returned 
to this Christ and says in his theological autobiography, as his 
travel-weary spirit came close up to the satisfying Spirit of 
life: "And all the sages and seers I have known have come to 
seem to me but as satellites of satellites, when compared with 
this blazing sun of the Christian Revelation. 



WILLIAM EDGAR CRABTREE 243 

It is of Christ the revelator the argument in Colossians is 
made: ''That in all things He might have the pre-eminence, 
over thrones and dominions, principalities and powers. For it 
was God's good pleasure that in Him should all fullness dwell, 
in this One is the image of the invisible God, the first born of all 
creation. ' ' Nor could the great apostle speak to Corinthians of 
any other knowledge than "that the light of the gospel of the 
glory of Christ who is the image of God, should shine upon 
them. Seeing it is God he said "Light shall shine out of dark- 
ness," who shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowl- 
edge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." That 
God's glory was in the face of Jesus Christ, the apostle Peter 
even in old age declared, for the Transfiguration scene was ever 
present: "For we did not follow cunningly devised fables, 
when we made known to you the power and coming of our 
Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eye witnesses of his majesty. 
For he received from God the Father honor and glory when 
there was borne such a voice to him by the Majestic Glory, 
'This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased'." To 
gather up in himself the light of God for us, sufficient to lead us 
out of night into the light of life ; to bring it down to the plane 
where we live, make it intelligible, make it warm, make it com- 
pelling, this was the mission of Jesus Christ, asserted by him- 
self in all frankness and beautiful humility. In his direct and 
clear word they learned, "lam the way and the truth and the 
life. No man cometh unto the Father but by me." Because it 
is easy and natural to understand and love Jesus Christ, it be- 
comes easy and natural to understand and love the Almighty 
God and to possess toward him the spirit of sons and daughters, 
by which we cry, Abba, Father. 

I am sure I have discovered the true apostolic succession. It 
is in the words of Paul to Timothy: "And the things which 
thou hast heard from me among many witnesses, the same 
commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others 
also." We count the epistle of Paul in which this is written 
important, but it seems in second place to Paul's living epistle, 
the human personality. The apostle to the Gentiles claimed to 



244 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

have received his revelation from the Lord himself. There are 
six personalities sanctified in this line of succession, with other 
ones implied : God the Father, Jesus Christ, Paul, Timothy, faith- 
ful men, and those taught by them. It is not a close official 
succession. The body of disciples succeeded the Apostles and 
apostolic men. It is consecrated personality and not official 
order that is of consequence, always has been of consequence 
and that only is of consequence. 

The aged Paul was very anxious that the torches be well 
lighted, so his own might be in safety extinguished. The 
torch that has ever illumined the world is the man of faith. 
How graphically this prophet told it in 2 Cor. 3 and 4 : Christ is 
the icon of God; you, beholding as in a mirror the glory of 
the Lord, are transformed into the same icon, from glory to 
glory. The glory of God is in the face of Christ ; we look into 
the face and are changed from glory to glory. On the other 
hand the glory will not change the faces veiled by the god of 
this world. Grace and glory are not sacramental but spiritual. 
The true succession has ever been and is the heart and life 
touched and transformed by the love of Christ and in turn 
telling the story, this Life story, to another in such a way as 
to kindle love therein. 

How essential preaching has ever been and will ever be. How 
needful that as Jesus went away he should send the Holy Spirit 
to animate and direct, forever, the progress of this proclama- 
tion and this life manifestation. 

The Scriptures hold a large place with us and of necessity. 
In much of the early church there was a paucity of Scriptures. 
But the fundamental thing was there, the warm stream of 
Christ's life, the Holy Spirit in the souls of believers, inspiring 
them by this quenchless love for Christ to daily living for him. 
So many things, venerated some of them, so indispensable we 
have come to feel, were absent then, yet the truth without these 
things was preached with power and effectiveness. The great 
essential was there, the true succession, the ongoing divine life, 
Christ's life, was there, one personality lighting another and 
the multitude of disciples grew. 



WILLIAM EDGAR CRABTREE 245 

The sermon of our fathers was true, "Faith eometh by hear- 
ing and hearing by the word of God. ' ' Jesus wrote nothing but 
he taught men. He poured into their souls the truth of God. 
He patiently taught and lived the life of God before them. He 
noted the change going on. There came a day when he felt it 
safe enough to depart and leave his kingdom to the testimony 
of these men, reinforced by the testimony of the Holy Spirit. 
There was one message that throbbed with life for them. It 
was Jesus Christ, his ministry, death, resurrection, coronation: 
A warm, overcoming, radiant person, Elder, Brother, faithful 
and merciful High Priest and Lord Jesus. Out they went to 
proclaim him to Jew and Gentile, bond and free, male and 
female, and they found confirmation in the glad response every- 
where. It was not the scheme of redemption, nor plan of sal- 
vation, nor trinities of truths that brought the multitude to 
confession, when our Walter Scott and Barton Stone preached. 
It was the Messiahship of Jesus, the sufficiency of faith as ex- 
pressed in the good confession and the immediate acceptance 
in baptism of Jesus as Lord, that made them mighty. The 
living Christ brought near must be approached and claimed 
and his Spirit must enter us, as in faith and baptism we yield 
to him. When Christ is realized as present and leading by the 
preacher and when those who hear are made sensible of his 
nearness, his love constrains surrender unto him. 

"The Lord is risen indeed, 
He is here for your love, for your need, 
Not in the grave or sky 
But here where we live and die, 
And true the word that is said, 
' Why seek ye the living among the dead. ' ' ' 

Let us too be content to preach Jesus Christ, who was dead 
but is alive forever more, for he hath the keys of death and 
Hades. He only can loose us from our sins and make us to be a 
kingdom of priests unto the God and Father. 

That famous apostolic preacher had his text selected in the 
midst of Old Testament Isaiah, but it is written of him, "that 
beginning at that Scripture he preached unto him Jesus," and 



246 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

it is also written that he baptized him and sent him away re- 
joicing in the consciousness of the divine fellowship. 

It is the honorable unofficial succession in which we stand, 
ordained by the living commandment to bear fruit, and sealed 
by the Holy Spirit which was promised. ' f For all things are of 
God who reconciled us unto himself through Christ and gave 
unto us the ministry of reconciliation ; to-wit, that God was in 
Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not reckoning unto 
them their trespasses and having committed unto us the word 
of reconciliation. We are ambassadors, therefore, on behalf of 
Christ, as though God were entreating by us, we beseech you 
on behalf of Christ, be ye reconciled to God." It was Christ, 
alive, present, whose love is forever full, forever flowing free, 
that these men preached. It is Christ who today leadeth the 
truly useful preachers in triumph and maketh manifest through 
them the savor of his knowledge in every place. 

How fares in the spirit of the day we know that other truth 
they stressed, the priesthood of believers? This is, as never 
another time, the layman's hour. The pew preaches. The 
clergyman dims but not the preacher; the church is no longer 
a field but a force. The true preacher rejoices that the office 
of pastor is becoming for him and elders more and more re- 
stricted, and the day dawns when these must be promoted to 
head shepherds; the church be the company of pastors; and 
the world, brought by this augmented order of shepherds into 
touch and sympathy with the kingdom of God, will constitute 
the flock. Jesus meant us to grow into this. Said he, "Who- 
soever would become great among you shall be your minister ; 
and whosoever would be first among you shall be servant of 
all." This is meaningless if it do not assert discipleship and 
ministry as equivalent. And there is no waiting for an extra 
setting apart or confirmation. Baptism and sanctification are 
syncronous and the disciple is the Christian officer. Here we 
behold the faith of Christ, here the love of Christ, here the 
judgment of Christ touching men. Not to selected ones but to 
the company of saints, his work is committed. It is his good 
pleasure to give the kingdom to the little flock. 



WILLIAM EDGAR CRABTREE 247 

Shall we show his faith and love misplaced and his judgment 
in man poor? Where, if at all, will trusted personality fail 
him? So far, he seems to have no other way to leaven all the 
measure of meal. I believe the great progress of truth is at 
hand. I believe the Spirit moves in the ranks of believers. I 
can see the thought of individual responsibility to him who 
calls, toning up every consciousness. Assertion is here. As 
never before, the work of teaching and evangelization passes 
into the hands of disciples. The expanded Bible school work, 
Young People's work, Special Missions, Evangelistic bands, 
work of Social Betterment, and in many other paths of service 
go out the willing ones, each a minister and some have come to 
be servants. In His name, they go. 

In the sight of a value set on us by the Lord, this man we 
go out to win is worthy of all our prayers and endeavors on 
his behalf. We may not be careless in the pursuit. If per- 
chance he be fallen low, nevertheless he is invaluable. Though 
his attitude be unfavorable, we must not despair unto ceasing. 
He is precious. A trusted master has reminded us that "Jesus 
Christ was the first to bring the value of every human soul to 
light, and what he did no one can any more undo." For his 
own enrichment of life win him ; for what it will mean to unite 
his spirit with the Holy Spirit of Christ; for what his enlist- 
ment will mean to the circle of spirits he touches and leads; 
for the sake of the children who come after him, win him ; win 
him that the succession of light, personality begetting per- 
sonality in divine life, may send the gospel conquering and to 
conquer even unto the uttermost. 



GEORGE ALEXANDER CAMPBELL 

pETER CAMPBELL and Isabella McLarty (Campbell) parents of George 
■■■ A. were born in Inverary Argyleshire, Scotland. Both the Campbells 
and the McLartys were Highland Scotch, the Gaelic being the language of 
each home. Over eighty years ago both families settled near Ridgetown, 
some seventy miles east of Detroit, in Ontario, Canada. 

Here on a farm the subject of this sketch was born, the youngest of ten 
children. 

The Campbells were Presbyterians in Scotland, and the McLartys were 
Baptists. In the early part of the Reformation both families became Dis- 
ciples. The maternal grandfather, Archibald, was locally a distinguished 
Bible student and teacher. 

In 1882 the family moved to Portage la Prairie, Manitoba. From this 
place George went to Des Moines to attend Drake University, after having 
taken high school work in Winnipeg. After spending four years in Drake 
he was graduated in 1892 with the degree A.B. While in college he began 
to preach. After being graduated he took a pastorate at Hiawatha, Kan. 
After staying there two and a half years he left to attend the University 
of Chicago. From this college he received the degree of Bachelor of 
Divinity. 

After leaving the university Mr. Campbell became editor of ''The 
Oracle. ' ' During his editorship its name was changed to ' ' The Christian 
Century." While editor he became the first pastor of the Austin church, 
Chicago. During his ministry the present splendid lot was secured, and the 
present building erected. 

Mr. Campbell was for more than seven years pastor of the First 
church, Hannibal. This is one of our best churches. Its membership num- 
bers considerably upwards of one thousand, and they compose the most in- 
fluential people of the city. 

In 1892 Mr. Campbell married Miss May Jameson, of Des Moines. She 
has been an ideal preacher's wife. There are five strong children, three 
girls and two boys, to grace this happy family. 

George Campbell is an exceptionally fine preacher. The editor of this 
volume heard him deliver the sermon which follows, and requested that he 
should furnish it for the New Living Pulpit, and it is no mean compliment 
when it is said it adorns the splendid sermons with which it is associated. 

One charm about Mr. Campbell's preaching is its naturalness. There is 
nothing settled or formal in it whatever. Its main points are well thought 
out before delivery, but the occasion is depended upon for the accessories 
and inspiration. This adds freshness to all he says. Much that he says 

249 



250 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

is suggested by a rich repository of literature, gathered by a wide course 
of reading of the best authors. In equipment for good pulpit work, there 
are few, if any, preachers among the Disciples better prepared than Geo. A. 
Campbell. He has done what the greatest sermon builder of his age, Alex- 
ander Maclaren, said he always did, viz., made all his reading and all his 
experience contribute to his sermons. This is wise. To be a great preacher, 
one must make it the business of life. Every other thing must be subordinate 
to the one aim of the pulpit. Mr. Campbell is doing this, and the result 
is already illustrating the wisdom of his course. 

He has recently accepted a call to the pastorate of the Union Avenue 
Christian church, at St. Louis, Mo. This great church will give him ample 
scope and opportunity for the highest development of his fine qualifications 
for ministerial work. As he is yet a young man, we have a right to expect 
great things in his future ministry. 



CONVICTION 

By George A. Campbell 

Text. — Watch, stand firm in the faith, play the man, ~be strong: 
Let all ye do oe done in love. — 1 Cor. 16 :13-17. 

IN the autobiography of Mark Rutherford the young min- 
ister with the doubt and confusion of the age, wonders, if 
the opportunity should come to him to address a great audience 
gathered in some large cathedral, what would be the message he 
would give forth. After much pondering he concluded he could 
do no more than arise and declare: " Brethren, let us be dis- 
missed, I have nothing to say." 

The young man was intelligent, scholarly, thoughtful, inter- 
esting. He did not lack a message because he was illiterate, or 
narrow or uncultured. He had no message because he had no 
conviction. The intellectual confusion of the age had dis- 
possessed him of the Christian evangel. 

In his undoing is he not typical of many in the church 
today, of the church itself, in a measure ? 

We cannot go far without passion and abandonment, and 
we cannot have these without a controlling, sustaining, over- 
mastering conviction. If our innermost belief fails us, all is 
lost. If unwavering confidence possesses us, all is safe and 
victorious. 

The church, if really vital, must ever possess the conviction 
of a true and God-given message and the challenge of a great 
worth-while task. 

The great life creating periods of the church, the times of 
great accomplishments and great spiritual heights, the times 
when the borders of the kingdoms have been extended and the 
souls of countless have been quickened by the consciousness of 
God, were those great epochs of spiritual discernment when 
the conviction concerning spiritual verities were the greatest. 

251 



252 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Let us mark a few of these times of profound faith. We can 
choose them almost at random. 

Think of the Christian age of Paul, of Paul himself. He 
moved and spoke with the certainty of Christ himself. One 
of his great words spoken to the early church is, "Put in 
trust with the gospel." This gospel to him was God's revela- 
tion to men. It was a sure and trustworthy word. He gave 
himself with utter abandonment to its proclamation. Nothing 
else was of commanding value to him but this gospel, put in his 
trust and in the trust of the church. It was transcendently 
paramount, and by this trust was the church highly privi- 
leged, highly honored, purified and glorified. 

The foundations of the church were laid by Paul and the 
other apostles and Christians, all men of profound convictions. 
Men of double mind could not have built for the ages. 

We, of today, are put in trust with this same gospel. If we 
are approved to be worthy of such high responsibility, we 
must guard our convictions and see that this gospel has no 
dissipating and paralyzing rival. 

Again, making a journey of many centuries, think of those 
staunch covenanters of Scotland, who made their century one 
of the great creative ones in the history of the church. 

When in the Greyfriars church they signed the covenant, a 
militant document in honor of the Christ whom they ever put 
first, they were aware that many of them were signing their 
own death sentence. It was only a sweet and mighty convic- 
tion that could have urged them to this commitment. Some 
wrote after their signatures "Until Death;" and some opened 
their own veins and signed their names with their own blood, 
a mark of entire surrender to Him who had shed His blood 
for them. 

One of their greatest comrades when facing death, said "My 
conscience I cannot submit." "It is the creed in five words 
of all good soldiers of Christ. The Illiad of the martyrs." 

Enquiring as to the cause of the great revival in the Eastern 
States of some hundred years ago, Lyman Beecher was told 
that the people had learned to pray again. Prayer meant a 



GEORGE ALEXANDER CAMPBELL 253 

renewal of faith, of conviction, a new intimacy with God, 
and just here lies the secret of all forward-looking periods 
in the history of God's people. 

Our immediate fathers in the faith were men of profound 
conviction. They planted churches " every wherei ' ' Their 
physical resources were usually small, but their accomplish- 
ments were surprisingly great. 

When I go into a village or city and find there a Christian 
church, I say to myself, a prophet of God once walked these 
streets and entered these homes: and translated the gospel 
that was entrusted to him into this building and organization 
and in a larger way into the lives of the souls of the pioneers, 
most of whom have joined the Church triumphant. 

The founders of these churches received pitifully small 
wages for their work; often they were belligerent in their pre- 
sentation of their message; but they possessed the essence of 
all true ministers, viz., the consciousness that they spoke 
for God. 

Every day demands its prophetic seers. We can never be 
worthy successors of those gone before unless we look to our 
convictions, which alone will give the inner-support that the 
soul must have, if it moves out to high endeavor and to 
hard tasks. 

Is the church hesitating to undertake heroic work? Is the 
ministry somewhat cooled in its ardor and passion? Are the 
gifts to the cause of missions secured by labored manipula- 
tions; are they lamentably small? Is the membership of the 
church dangerously absorbed in the things of this world? 
Does a love of pleasure unduly possess the professed followers 
of Christ? Is there a diminishing of conscientious attendance 
upon Divine worship? Are we failing to have zest for prayer 
and Bible study? Is the art of meditation being lost? Is 
secularization of our lives taking place ? Is the church without 
great abandon and passion? Has it ceased to risk all for its 
faith? 

Henry Scott Holland of England writes this accusing word: 
"Our Christianity is sick — our Christianity is poisoned — our 



254 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Christianity is convicted. We have betrayed it. We have been 
false to it. If it were not so, we could not have engaged in 
this war. We have failed to retain our Christianity in its true 
and normal health. We have weakened it by pride, by cove- 
tousness, by the inordinate love of riches, by luxury, by selfish- 
ness, by worldliness, by national jealousies, by commercial 
greed, by suspicion and hate of rival peoples, by ambition, by 
exploiting of weaker races, by gambling, by drink, by lust 
and lies, by blind devilries, by godless cruelty, by heartless 
indifference. So the wrong has gone very deep. Self-deceit 
glozed it from us; until, in the wild glare of war, the worst 
stood out disclosed." 

If to any considerable degree these words be true, we must 
look to the foundations of our faith. Repairs of non-essen- 
tails will suffice but little. Improved methods will not count 
for much. We must restore to ourselves faith, vital, compell- 
ing faith in the absolute leadership and redemption of Jesus 
Christ. 

The age in which we live has been greatly influenced by 
scientific thought. The scientist has dominated our thinking. 
His has been a wonderful contribution. He has worked in one 
of Cod's realms and no one should belittle his laborious 
earnestness and his splendid achievements. Wonderfully has 
he enlarged the horizon of our world. He has given us breadth 
and truth for our thinking. 

While honoring the scientist, we have also feared that he 
was cutting away the cornerstone of our faith. We have been 
oppressed by a feeling that all is not as stable as we once 
thought. The acumen of the scientist has entered every field, 
even the examination of our sacred Scriptures and doctrines 
and institutions. This keen and rigid examination has af- 
frighted and unsettled many in the church. Criticism has 
robbed them of their message. They feel that modern thought 
has taken away their Lord and they know not where it has 
put him. 

Being unsettled, like Mark Rutherford, they have nothing 



GEORGE ALEXANDER CAMPBELL 255 

to say. If they speak, it is with interrogative sentences. The 
gospel cannot be proclaimed but by declaration and affirmation. 

If the church is to have compelling convictions, it must get 
rid of this fear that science and criticism have made doubtful 
or can ever make doubtful, the message of the gospel. 

If the church is to have compelling convictions, it must get 
rid of this fear that science and criticism have made doubtful 
or can ever make doubtful, the message of the gospel. 

Years ago Mr. Christopher Neville, a clergyman of ample 
means, gave a dinner to many of England's leading men of 
art, science, politics and religion. No program had been pre- 
pared, but after the dinner, Dean Stanley, being elected chair- 
man, proposed that they consider this question: "What men 
will dominate the future?" His proposal was accepted and 
with ready and unanimous assent. 

After a few had spoken, Mr. Huxley was called upon and 
listened to, as he always was, with profound respect. He said: 
"The future will be dominated by the men who stick most 
closely to the facts." As he elaborated this thesis, he made 
a very deep impression. 

The next speaker was Edmund Miall. He said he quite 
thoroughly agreed with Mr. Huxley that the future would be 
dominated by men of facts, but he went on to say that all 
facts must be included and that "the greatest fact of history is 
Christianity and at the root of Christianity is Christ. ' ' 

Mr. Miall was right. Christ is the unassailable fact of our 
faith. 

Criticism cannot rob history of his personality and power, 
nor of our own consciousness of him. 

Christ is the New Testament. And he is the message for the 
Church. He is the gospel. 

In the New Testament we find this sublime personality con- 
scious of God, conscious of his own holiness and of his God- 
likeness, and his redeeming power for all men. Here is no per- 
sonality that depends upon the technicalities of historical or 
textual criticism. Their conclusions are of small moment in 
the realm of faith. We have done them too much honor. No 



256 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

matter what the conclusions as to authorship or text, the 
Christ of the New Testament remains untouched and unharmed. 

"I have a life with Christ to live, 
But ere I live it must I wait 
Till learning can clear answer give 
Of this and that book's date? 

' ' I have a life in Christ to live, 
I have a death in Christ to die; — 
And must I wait till science give 
All doubts a full reply? 

1 1 Nay rather, while the sea of doubt 
Is raging wildly round about, 
Questioning of life and death and sin, 
Let me creep within 

"Thy fold, O Christ, and at Thy feet 
Take but the lowest seat, 
And hear Thine awful voice repeat 
In gentlest accents, heavenly sweet, 

"Come unto Me, and rest; 
Believe Me, and be blest." 

The New Testament with its spirit of unity and love, with 
its tremendous conceptions, with its results of such far- 
reaching influence cannot be explained without Christ, its 
heart, its reality, its all. 

Science is concerned alone with impersonal law, religion 
with personal love. Christ is the revelation of God's personal 
love for humanity. 

"Let knowledge grow from more to more 
But more of reverence in us dwell." 

Again faith is rational: but it rests not alone on pure rea- 
son. "Nothing worthy of being proved can be proved." 
All our great conclusions in life go beyond the measurement 
of cold intellect. 

Christ is a living Spirit. The human soul experiences 
him. The writers of the New Testament denned the gospel as 



GEORGE ALEXANDER CAMPBELL 257 

Power. It has ever been that. Through emotion, meditation, 
prayer, the soul finds its way to the living Christ. He speaks 
to it great sustaining words of conviction. "Once I was 
blind but now I can see," is the testimony of countless souls. 
The power of Christ redeeming and keeping and holding to 
the eternal things is evidence that no science can destroy. 

Two students in the University of Wisconsin, who were 
chums, were both indifferent, scoffers it might be said, of 
religion. Last year one was converted. The other made light 
of the conversion and wrote his friend of his scepticism. The 
converted one wrote back: "Something has come into my life, 
has made me different, what I once hated, I now love. I have 
a great passion to serve. A light of joy and faith now pos- 
sesses me, instead of cynicism and despair." 

That something that changed this life needs to be taken to 
every soul. 

In this prosaic, critical age, the meditative side of our faith 
needs to be cultivated and strengthened. The voice of God 
in the soul is evidence that cannot be gainsaid and will lead 
the soul to take risks for his faith. Christianity, at last, is 
a religion of the inner self, not of the outward creed. 

"The Everlasting Mercy" after taking its hero through 
much filth grings to him a whisper of the gospel. The sur- 
roundings all suggest a life given to sin as indeed does his 
own appearance. Yet the gospel entered his soul as power and 
he says of that crucial moment: 

"I knew that I was done with sin 
I knew that Christ was born within 
I knew that Christ had given me birth 
To brother all the souls of earth.' ' 

Feeling thus the gospel must everwards command his life. 
It could have no rival. He could make no compromise. 

We should not be afraid of experiencing religion; nor 
should we seek to suppress our emotional nature. What else is 
there of life, save emotion? But is not this doctrine subject 
to abuses, someone will say? Certainly. Every great affirma- 
tion of Christianity, by some, is carried to absurd and false 



258 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

extremes. To affirm is to risk — Jesus took the risk at every 
point of his teaching. 

The second great evidential support of Christianity rests 
upon the daily companionship of the Spirit of Christ. 

"I knew that Christ had given me birth 
To brother all the souls of earth.' f 

This couplet suggests the third path to compelling convic- 
tion. Christianity has set for its adherents a great task, viz., 
the conquest of the world for its Master. Every human will 
is to be brought into harmony with the Divine. Not alone are 
all peoples to be evangelized but all people long since evan- 
gelized are to be made completely Christian. 

"Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in 
heaven" is the petition the Lord himself taught his disciples 
to pray. His Church will offer that prayer till its fulfillment 
is realized in a transformed and a redeemed world. 

Christianity seeks not only to win individuals to its leader 
but to make all the relationships of individuals Christian. It 
seeks to establish a church, a family of God, a brotherhood. 

Movements, institutions, and nations are to be made Chris- 
tian. Perhaps the whole creation which groaneth together till 
now is also to be brought more perfectly under the will of 
Christ. 

The task is a gigantic one. It takes hearts of conviction to 
undertake it, but here is the truth we are seeking, viz., to 
undertake it is to gain conviction. 

Hence the third pillar upon which conviction rests is service, 
working at the Christian task. The will is always strength- 
ened when acting. The doers have been the believers. 

Faith is proportioned to the greatness of the tasks under- 
taken. 

One would think that the missionaries with a tremendous 
background of unfaith would falter and become unbelieving. 
The contrary has been true. The reaction from their work 
has so supported their faith as to give them an honored place 
among the Church's saints. 

Faith exercised leads to greater faith. 



GEORGE ALEXANDER CAMPBELL 259 

If the Church wishes greater conviction, let it dare more for 
its Christ. 

Baptism and the Lord's Supper have a prominent place in 
the symbolism of the Church. They both teach the lesson of 
entire surrender to the Christ and his cause. Baptism is a 
burial with the Lord, and a resurrection to his life, to his task. 
The Lord after his baptism began his life work of self-abnega- 
tion. He started in the path that led to Calvary. 

How profoundly meaningful is the Lord's Supper. 

How significant was the scene of its first observance. The 
old and the new had met. The old was about to slay the new. 
Love was to be slain by hate. 

Men of blindness, passion and darkness of heart, rushed 
through the night to do their deed of violence. Calmly the 
disciples were dedicating themselves to the new order, to the 
reign of love, of brotherhood. They only became fully aware 
of the meaning of the First Supper weeks afterwards, perhaps 
never completely fathomed its depths. 

If we made this Supper a dedication of ourselves to the. 
world-sorrow, to the poor, to the selfish business world, to the 
laborers, to the indifferent rich, to the childhood of the race, 
to the Christless places of the earth, if we really dedicated 
ourselves from week to week to Christ, to all he loves, how 
speedily would we help to usher in the reign of our Almighty 
Redeemer and how quickly we would help to remove the 
suspicion that the Church is not fully standing for her own 
Lord. Complete dedication means unquestioning conviction. 

It is a far cry from our comfortable observance of the Com- 
munion to the first night of its institution. Still it means the 
same. It is a Eucharist. It pleads for entire dedication — and 
in proportion as we give ourselves entirely to the Master, will 
satisfying, supporting and untiring conviction be born in our 
souls. "The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the kingdom." 
Hardships will not defeat the Zion of our God; but ease and 
comfort and dislike of abandon for him will. His Church is 
retarded by our slackness. It cannot be defeated. He is the 
final guarantee of its success, the ultimate builder. 



260 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Watch, stand firm in the faith, play the man, be strong, love. 
This text suggests the three ways to conviction. 

Having conviction supported by right thinking, prayerful 
meditation and heroic willing, the Church of the Living God 
faces a world distraught, much in need of Christian guidance 
and leadership. The Church itself has all too long been hesi- 
tant as to its faith. 

One of the generals in the present Avar wrote to his com- 
mander-in-chief, "My left has been driven back, my right is 
routed, I will now attack with the center." He did attack 
and won. 

Has not the doubt and hesitation of the Church resulted 
because we have been giving too much attention to the right 
and left ? Victory will be ours when we attack with the center. 
Christ the unsupplanted, the unharmed, leading the forces. 

If the Church be whole at heart, if it be not enfeebled by 
insidious doubt, it will face the world with its changing con- 
ditions, with proper adjutments in its message. 

It will educate the children ; call sinners to repentance, make 
vital with the presence of the Spirit its temples of worship; 
create an atmosphere appealing to all the hungry-hearted; 
interpret anew the deep things of the Word; make its member- 
ship not to desire mere entertainment but to crave the higher 
things of the soul. In assurance it will comfort the sorrow- 
ing and heal the broken-hearted; its best young life will fol- 
low in the steps of the missionary heralds of the gospel; it will 
bury its dead "in unfaltering trust." 

Yea, and more ; the church of conviction will have leadership 
in the labor movement, in the world's reforms, in the woman's 
movement and temperance cause. It will know the direction 
to take ; for the Spirit will guide it into all truth. 

"Attack." If you cannot attack, "stand;" if you cannot 
stand "die," was the message of a great general to his men. 

The church in every great age of conviction has led in 
"attack." It must attack again. It can never just stand. 
If some members of the universal church die it is only that 



GEORGE ALEXANDER CAMPBELL 261 

the church may attack again, and, because of blood sacrificed 
win still more notable victories. 

The war which now disgraces Christendom would not have 
occurred if the church had been sufficiently Christ-like and 
efficiently commanding and aggressive. 

We cannot change the past. 

The war is a New Calvary; and perhaps a new resurrection. 
The faith of Christendom springs from Calvary and the Resur- 
rection. Out of the awful cataclysm of the present convic- 
tion, mighty conviction will come. 

When the dark clouds of the world's tragedy hang over us, 
Christ's darkest words, "My God! My God! why hast thou 
forsaken me?" must be recalled with added sadness, but also 
with profound significance. 

Helplessness seemed to be in the heart of Jesus and despair 
filled every soul of the little group of his followers, as a sym- 
bol of that awful event. The light of day ceased to shine. 
For the time being Calvary meant to the disciples the bank- 
ruptcy of every noble ideal. 

But Calvary, despite its anger, cruelty and ignominious 
death, we now see, was God's love breaking through to hearten 
our weak and fearsome humanity. 

After Calvary came the Resurrection, the Ascension, Pente- 
cost, the Victorious Church. 

So will it be after this present Calvary that has upset the 
world and which is causing to flow the life blood of millions 
of fellow-men, has passed. 

God will yet speak — is speaking in his wrath. 

If ever a new epoch in this world had birth, certainly one 
of the greatest epochs is now in the throes of birth. 

The war is the breakdown of human reason. The voice of 
the church was ignored. The prayer of the Christ was de- 
spised. Corsica, not Nazareth, has had sway. And its sway 
has led to the undoing of civilization. This world cannot go 
on without Christ. His prophets will now take courage. 
They will speak more confidently in the name of their King. 
God has special times in which his Church forms a mighty 



262 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

faith — gains vital conviction. Are we not at the dawning of 
such a time? 

The gates of Hades are wide open these days, but they will 
not prevail. No nation will win this war. God will win. 
The Church will go on conquering and to conquer until the 
kingdom of God will include all the peoples and all souls. 
Christ will build his Church and finally present it to himself, 
"a gorious church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such 
thing: and that it should be holy and without blemish. 



FREDERICK W. BURNHAM 

T OED KAMES in his "Elements of Criticism" suggests, as' our ideas 
■*— ' come in trains, that it is not often a popular speaker makes a good 
statesman. He thinks brilliant oratorical powers are not associated with a 
logical mind. This is not true in the case of Mr. Durnham. He is! a states- 
man as well as a popular preacher. He has shown conspicuous ability in his 
management of the American Christian Missionary Society. 

Frederick William Burnham was born in Chapin, Illinois, in 1871, the 
son of New England parents. His father, a physician, died when Frederick 
was eleven years old. After finishing the public school young Burnham 
became a telegraph operator to earn the necessary money to take him to 
college. After a year at Illinois College, Jacksonville, he entered Eureka 
College from which he graduated in 1895. Later he took some postgraduate 
work in the University of Chicago. Immediately after graduation from 
Eureka he became pastor of the church at Carbondale, Illinois, where he 
had the rare comradeship and counsel of H. W. Everest. The splendid 
church at Charleston, 111., with its new building challenged his strength and 
there he spent five years of happy useful ministry. In 1901 he was called 
to Decatur, 111., where he spent six more years, built up a strong con- 
gregation and erected a new church. Scarcely had that task been com- 
pleted when the First church of the Capitol City, Springfield, 111., called him 
to a similar task. Of this ministry Finis Idleman says: "Here he main- 
tained a superb ministry in the midst of exacting duties, issuing in that 
psalm of praise, the most beautiful church building among the Disciples 
of Christ. It would have seemed enough to content one's conscience to 
have wrought so well and to work unworried by the call of need elsewhere. 
But not so could the soul of Frederick Burnham be at peace. The Wil- 
shire Boulevard church of Los Angeles, Cal., looked over the Brotherhood 
for a man to command that opportune field and to build up a great con- 
gregation in that strategic center. It turned its eyes to Springfield, 111., 
and made its earnest appeal to the heart which has been dominated al- 
ways by the call of the larger need. Contrary to the expectations and 
the wishes of many who knew about the excellent accomplishment in 
Springfield, Mr. Burnham responded with a soldier's readiness and under- 
took the task in the city by the western sea. His work there had 
scarcely begun. But the need of a capable leader in our Home Mis- 
sionary activities never knocked at a more responsive heart nor did it 
knock in vain. The dominant motive of service moved him to turn aside 
from the crowning passion of a pastor's life, that of preaching, and to 
take up the duties the Brotherhood would have him bear." 

263 



264 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Mr. Burnham was elected president of the American Christian Mis- 
sionary Society at the convention in Atlanta, Ga., but the changes nec- 
essary in the constitution of the Society to make him executive head 
of the Society and chairman of its Board of Trustees were not finally 
adopted until the convention in Los Angeles in 1915. He is now serv- 
ing our Brotherhood in that capacity. 

Mr. Burnham 's personality is much in his favor as a public speaker. 
He impresses one with the idea of a superb manhood. Nor will one feel 
mistaken when listening to him. His mental characteristics correspond 
with his personal appearance. His mind is well stored with wisely 
selected reading, and he soon convinces his hearers that they are listen- 
ing to a great preacher, as well as an indefatigable worker. 

In his present position as president of the American Christian Mis- 
sionary Society, he has a great opportunity to use those qualities of mind 
and heart which come to few men so freely as they have come to the 
subject of this sketch. 





. ! i 



Very cordially yours^ 
/5T> 




<X^n/, 



THE COMPULSION OF RESPONSIBILITY 

By Frederick W. Burnham 

Text. — "Z must work the works of Him that sent me while it is 
day: the night cometh when no man can work." — John 9:5. 

IT is at once conceded, upon the mere statement of the case, 
that the motive power which moves a man is different 
from that which moves a stone, turns a wheel, lifts a cloud, 
or issues from a dynamo. We feel the limitations of our 
language when we apply the term "motive," with its implied 
necessitated action, to man at all. Yet, in order that the facts 
of our experience may be collected for rational review it is 
necessary that we use in the mental real terms borrowed from 
the material. 

That the strenuous life of our day demands high-pressure 
motive power is apparent. If the youth of our time are to 
succeed in life's larger purposes they must have developed 
within them a dynamic of sufficient potentiality to meet the 
severest resistance which an age of clogging materialism may 
impose. The tasks set for men today are stupendous, whilst 
the tendencies toward inertia, and the opportunities for ease 
have abundantly increased. 

In expressing his sense of satisfaction with a life which, 
to the eyes of ordinary men, must have seemed fragmentary 
and incomplete, Jesus said to the Father, ' ' I have glorified thee 
on the earth, I have finished the work thou gavest me to do." 
A little later when the patient endurance of suffering, the su- 
preme revelation of love, and the final sacrifice were fulfilled 
and completed, he added, "It is finished." These words con- 
stitute the most glorious climax to a human life that has ever 
been attained on earth. The closing words of the great apostle 
to the Gentiles are nearest next, as, with Christ formed in 
him, he echoes the sentiment, saying, "I am leady to be of- 

265 



266 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

fered, the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought the 
good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith." 
How few lives, even of those that stand out above the multi- 
tude, in any considerable measure approach this ideal! 

May it not be that one of the chief differences between the 
life of Jesus and that of the average man with respect to the 
accomplishment of purpose, — the attainment of true success, — 
lies in the hold which the sense of moral obligation takes upon 
his life, — a difference of the soul's response to the primal 
motives of action? 

Before every death is a life, and beneath a great life are the 
main-springs of its activity. If we turn back to view the record 
of Jesus' life we shall find it crowded full of work. By 
Jacob's well, though athirst and weary with his journey, he 
made his need a means to the rescue of a soul almost drowned 
in sin. After the transfiguration, while his disciples would 
build booths for rest upon the mount, he hastened down to 
heal the paralytic boy, and when they would pause to theorize 
of sin and its evolution, he opened blinded eyes. Such was 
his constant labor. Of only one day do we read in which he 
failed to accomplish his full purpose. "In Nazareth he did 
not many mighty works because of their unbelief." If we 
look for a motive-power sufficient to hold life up to such 
strenuous exertions we may find it expressed in the response 
which Jesus made to the dogmatic speculation of his dis- 
ciples as to whose sin caused the beggar to be born blind. 
Note the scene. 

It was evening. As the sun sank behind the hills into the 
Great Sea the Sabbath day was closing. It had been a trying 
day for the Master. He had again met the Pharisees and 
Sadducees in the temple. He had tried to bring them to a 
knowledge of the truth, but meeting only stubborn opposi- 
tion and willful blindness, he so charged their sin home upon 
them, that, in their rage, they took up stone to drive him from 
the temple. Having escaped them, he was about to pass out of 
the city; overwhelmed with grief and sick at heart with a 
sense of the world's darkness and misery, when the sight of a 



FREDERICK W. BURNHAM 267 

poor blind beggar arrested his thought and revived his energy. 
He paused and looked upon the beggar. Here, at least, he 
could cause the light to shine, and here its illuminating rays 
would be welcome! "While, therefore, his disciples raised the 
question as to " Whose sin," Jesus, yielding to the urgent mo- 
tive that swayed his soul, turned aside their untimely question, 
and welcomed the present duty with the words, "I must work 
the words of Him that sent me, while it is day; the night 
cometh when no man can work." 

Jesus said, "I must work," and followed the word with 
the deed. The word is one of the soul-keys to his life. It 
was the expression of that inward motive which was moving 
him in his daily tasks. If the multitudes turned away and 
forsook him because of his severe teaching, still he must give 
them the truth. If nine out of ten lepers, healed by his divine 
power, forgot to thank him or give praise to God, still he 
must heal the sick, bind up the broken-hearted and proclaim 
the acceptable year of the Lord. If Jerusalem rejected him, 
and refused the salvation he brought to her gates, yet he must 
weep for her sin and preach deliverance to her captives. 
When friends forsook him, and enemies, with triumphant 
wickedness adding injury to insult, wreaked cruel vengance 
upon him, he still must endure unto the end. And when, at 
last, a lost and ruined world denied him the lowest place and 
crucified its Prince of Peace, it was still this sense of ought- 
ness which made him endure the cross and despise its shame. 

Next to "I will," "I must" embraces the greatest fact of 
the human soul, — its response to a compelling motive. Yet 
it is a familiar phrase and may express a varied necessity. 
The slave, with the crack of the lash in his ears, says, "I 
must," and sullenly goes to his task. His is the necessity of 
obedience born of fear. The farmer says, "I must," and tills 
the soil and reaps the harvest. His "must" springs from 
desire. So also the politician says "I must," and, by the same 
force of ambition, becomes all things to all men, for an office. 
By the power of invincible genius the artist says "I must," 



268 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

and paints his picture, though he die in poverty waiting the 
tardy recognition of a fickle world. 

In the Merchant of Venice when Portia urges Shylock to 
clemency toward Antonio she says, "Then must the Jew be 
merciful." Shylock replies, "On what compulsion must I? 
Tell me that." 

By what compulsion must He toil, and suffer, and endure 
who was in the beginning with God, by whom the worlds were 
made? No being terrestial or celestial holds the lash over 
him, for he is the son and heir in the Father's house. He has 
no need whose supply compels exertion for the cattle on a 
thousand hills are his. He upholds the worlds by the word of 
His might. Ambition stirs Him not, for His is the glory with 
the Father before the worlds were. What motive stirs Him 
then, that he says "I must work?" 

"What were the souls He sought? 
What moved His inmost thought? 

The friendless and the poor, 

The woes none else could cure, 

The grateful sinner's cry, 

The heathen's heavenward sigh, — 
Each in their lot and line, 
Drew forth the love and life divine." 

The force which moved Him was the sense of the Father's 
will and of a weak world's need. "This," he says, "is the work 
of Him that sent me, and He sent me because of His love for 
a world that needs me." When Jesus said, "I must," there- 
fore, He expressed his sense of moral obligation, or the com- 
pulsion of responsibility. 

How great the power of this sense of compulsion was, and 
how readily Jesus yielded to it, we can only estimate as we 
comprehend the magnitude of the work God laid upon him, — 
a work so great and a sense of mission so compelling, as Henry 
Churchill King suggests, as would "simply topple any other 
brain that the world has ever known into insanity," — and as 
we realize the completeness with which He met the Father's 
will. The sense and urgency of responsibility seems never to 
have been absent from Him. Many of His words well up with 



FREDERICK W. BURNHAM 269 

this hidden power, as familiar scenes bring the truth before 
His mind. A sower goes forth to sow, and the sight reminds 
Him that He must sow the good seed of the kingdom, and He 
breathes that lesson in a parable for the people. Fishermen at 
their nets call up His mission of catching men. The pearl- 
merchant gathering goodly pearls thrusts upon his mind the 
fact that the truth and life He holds in trust are the world's 
pearls of greatest price. A wandering sheep recalls His 
Father's anxious care for the lost: the shepherds with their 
herds, His larger Pastorship, the folding of the sheep at night, 
His mighty task of gathering the children of men home into 
the fold of God ere the night comes on. 

The explanations which Jesus gave of his own conduct show 
us that so keenly did he feel the compulsion of duty, that, with 
him responsibility was practically necessity. When his friends 
wished him to tarry longer with them he said, "I must preach 
the good tidings of the kingdom of God to the other cities 
also; for therefore was I sent." When they told him that 
Herod would kill him if he went to Jerusalem he answered, "I 
must go on my way today and tomorrow and the days follow- 
ing: for it cannot be that a prophet perish out of Jerusalem." 
He showed his disciples that he must suffer many things ; that 
all things that were written of him must be fulfilled. "The 
Son of Man must be lifted up" and must rise from the dead. 
To the two on the way to Emmaus he said, "Ought not Christ 
to have suffered these things and to enter into his glory ? " At 
the last to all his disciples he explained, "Thus it is written, 
and thus it behooved Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead 
the third day, and that repentence and remission of sins should 
be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jeru- 
salem." Thus all the experiences of his life appeared in the 
line of duty, and the sense of responsibility lifted him up with 
sufficient power to meet them as they came. Given a life with 
such a vision of duty, and with so keen a perception of respon- 
sibility's compelling power, and it is not too much to expect 
that, though cut off in the midst of its years, it should close 
with the sublime record, "It is finished." 



270 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Now I suggest that the difference between success and fail- 
ure in the lives of many men is largely due to their possessing, 
or lacking this sense of responsibility as a motive-power; for 
successful life, as we have seen in Jesus' example, consists in 
accepting and meeting with steadfast resolution, life's responsi- 
bilities as they come. 

Eespecting their conduct in this regard men may be divided 
into three classes, viz: (1) The men who see, but fail to do. 
(2) The men who attempt to do, without seeing, (3) The men 
who both see and do. The first two fail, the last succeeds. 

In the first class are the men who see the opportunities of 
life, they know what responsibility means, they understand 
somewhat of its power; but their flagging energies, and inert 
lives do not relish such compulsion. The sense of moral obliga- 
tion has not been so trained as to be a dynamic force strong 
enough to carry them over difficulties. They attempt, therefore, 
to escape the stress, and preserve their ease, by neglecting the 
larger duties. I know of a man who refused to accept promo- 
tion and an increase of salary because he feared to assume the 
responsibility of the higher position. He was employed as a 
section hand on the railroad at a dollar per day, but preferred 
his hard work and scanty wages to the burdens of a foreman 
at fifty dollars per month. The moral sense of obligation to 
give his family the better advantages, and to get out of his 
own life the best results of which he was capable, was lacking. 
A fellow college-graduate of splendid natural ability, a well 
disciplined mind, adequate culture has been offered one oppor- 
tunity after another to put his powers to use where the results 
would be most gratifying to himself, helpful to some good 
cause, and worthy of culture he has received at the hands of 
church and state. He has refused, or given up, each one until 
now he is daily cursing his fate, but utterly lacking the neces- 
sary initiative to make it better. Here are the world's faith- 
less men and its drones. They constitute its balky but useless 
mass. They are the ten spies, as against Caleb and Joshua. 
They may be found in all ranks and classes from the profes- 
sional tramp to the dainty puppet whose only excuse for con- 



FREDERICK W. BURNHAM 271 

tinued tolerance is the fact that his father was a master of 
millions. 

The second class is composed of active, eager men, naturally 
endowed with a surplusage of vital energy, who are willing to 
rush into places of trust and obligation, but do so without any 
adequate moral sense of the responsibility involved. They are 
the descendants of Phaeton, would-be-drivers of the sun's 
chariot. Such were the sons of Zebedee when they wanted the 
places of honor in the Master's kingdom, and Jesus had to re- 
mind them that he had a " baptism to be baptized with, that 
they knew not of." These men are the world's inspired and 
enthusiastic blunderers. They often cause widespread ruin by 
their lack of this moral sense. Headlong party leaders; so- 
called successful politicians; legislators; men of State; but 
not statesmen, whose chief desire is to get the office and not to 
represent the people, men with no sense of responsibility to 
anybody except the gang that helped them in; promoters; 
rash speculators with other people's money; sensational preach- 
ers who rush into the pulpit with every new fad and fancy, 
happy if they may but spread their gauzy wings in the light 
today, though they be prone upon the ground tomorrow, — these 
and a host of others abundant illustration. There are instances 
enough of ministers who started in their high calling with 
large prospects of usefulness, men of superior mental endow- 
ment, who today are practical failures because they did not 
recognize the compulsion to study which the responsibility of 
the pulpit incurs. 

The third class succeed. They are not born successful, nor is 
success thrust upon them, but they know how to achieve it. 
They not only see the path of duty with its weight of burdens, 
but impelled by this inner motive-power, pursue it. The sense 
and urgency of responsibility does not leave them with the first 
flush of conscious accomplishment, but increases in power as 
the larger duties multiply. Cromwell was wont to admonish 
himself in these words: "In all thy mounting mount not so 
high thou canst not tell whither thou are mounting!" 

If one, inexperienced in such matters, were to go into one of 



272 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

the great mercantile establishments of our larger cities, and 
should attempt to find the proprietor, he would likely meet 
with some surprises. Perhaps upon entering he would be 
pleased to think that his search was to be brief, for there would 
meet him at the door a well-dressed, courteous gentleman, hav- 
ing the air of importance about him as he graciously received 
the stranger. "This is doubtless the proprietor," our friend 
thinks. Inquiry reveals the mistake. He is asked to follow 
this guide and they walk back into the building. As they pass 
along he sees numbers of men quietly at their work, any one 
of whom he thinks might be the man he seeks. They are all 
passed by. Finally at a far corner of the building, seated in 
a little office, with an electric light burning above his head; 
papers, books and files high on every side of him, with his face 
set with marks of strenuous effort, a man is pointed out hard at 
work making notes with a pen while he dictates to a stenog- 
rapher. The stranger is told to wait here an opportunity to 
speak with the proprietor, with the added warning to "make 
it short for he 's a busy man. ' ' He waits in meditative wonder. 
Here before him is the man who owns and controls this entire 
enterprise. He may say to any one or all the leisurely working 
employees that tomorrow he may go and he goeth. He dictates 
their hours of service and the wages they shall receive for their 
toil. They are his men. He himself is absolutely free. No one 
tells him that he must work today, yet here he is the busiest 
of them all. No one of them is so driven to his work, or exe- 
cutes it with such energy. What power holds him here, and 
impels the enginery of his being? Responsibility. A great 
business has been built up. Mighty interests are at stake. The 
ramifications of his commerce are multitudinous, and he must 
work. It is his response to this motive power which makes 
success. 

So in all departments of the world's activities. The men who 
accomplish the work which God has given them to do, are men 
who do not wait a second call from duty, but early rise and 
go to meet her. Their inner lives are the very complement of 
duty. Their powers swing toward duty as the rolling earth 



FREDERICK W. BURNHAM 273 

toward the rising sun. As the organ pipes, responding to the 
motion of the keys, speak forth their tones, so these lives break 
forth into song at the touch of Duty's fingers. As the waters 
of a mountain stream, rushing from their snowy beds, strike 
the miller's wheel and sing for joy at finding something to do, 
turning the turban into a wheel of song, so these lives, turning 
the shafts of the world's industry, make melody where they 
come. 

Among educators the need for a vital dynamic which shall 
redeem from waste, in after years, the efforts expended on 
youth in college is being urged. I quote from a recent utter- 
ance of Prof. John M. Coulter, of the University of Chicago. 

"You may have noticed in the spring and early summer the 
myriads of maple seeds that germinate and fairly cover the 
ground with their promising young foliage, and you may have 
wondered how few of them become trees. Special training 
seeks to germinate the seeds of spiritual and intellectual life, 
and when the tender foliage has become expanded to the sun- 
light, the plants are left to self-support ; but many do not develop 
further, and the mind and spirit enter upon their long vacation. 
The stagnation of those who have been quickened is one of the 
greatest sources of loss of energy that society is called upon to 
endure. Trained for battle and sent to the front by thousands, 
they desert by hundreds. . . . Many a life, beautiful and 
active under the whip of a vigorous teacher, when left to itself 
sinks into that torpor, that state of dreadful imbecility, whose 
horizon is bounded by the little things of one's daily life. The 
transition from outside direction to self-direction is the crucial 
test in every life, the shock which destroys or invigorates." 

If the tendency toward industrial education, the training of 
the young for self-support and active participation in useful 
pursuits, shall prove successful in the renewed quickening in 
our civilization of this sense of obligation and responsibility, 
its advance may be hailed with enthusiasm, and we may take 
just pride in the part which we are permitted to have in its 
advocacy. 

Distinguish, now, this compulsion of responsibility from the 



274 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

compulsion of outward necessity, — the inward sense of duty, 
from mere conformity to the requirements of the occasion. The 
one is expression of life, the other is repression. The one is 
expansive, the other is contractive. The one is liberty, fresh 
and inspiring; the other is bondage, stringent and chaffing. 
The one is compulsion from without, as when the mill-wheel 
turns from the pressure of water flowing over it ; the other is 
compulsion from within, as when the electric motor turns with 
lightning speed to release its pent up energy. By compulsion 
from without the unwilling laborer goes jaded and unstrung, 
self-shipped to his disagreeable task. By compulsion from 
within Henry Ward Beecher was wont to seek his cellar of Sun- 
day afternoons to shovel sand for an hour as a safety escape for 
the excess of vital energy within him. By compulsion from 
without the nominal Christian, belated, seeks a place in the con- 
gregation at the hour of worship, or grudgingly yields up a 
miserable pittance for the support of God's kingdom. By 
compulsion from within the apostle Paul counted all things as 
loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ, and became 
all things to all men that he might bring others. By compul- 
sion from without we spend days and weeks dawdling over 
the tasks of an hour. By compulsion from within Jesus com- 
pressed the work of a life into three brief years, saying as he 
toiled, "I must work the works of Him that sent me, while it 
is day ; the night cometh, when no man can work. ' ' 

Now in the realm of religion this compulsion of responsibility 
is the dynamic of Christianity. This sense of moral obligation 
is the creation of God's own handiwork within us, and to it he 
appeals both for our personal rescue from sin, and for the proc- 
lamation of the gospel unto the ends of the world. 

When Jesus commissioned his Apostles to preach the gospel 
to every creature, hanging upon their proclamation the awful 
consequence that "He that believeth and is baptized shall be 
saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned," he relied 
upon each individual's response to the call and authority of 
duty in the accomplishment of his own destiny. If in the pres- 
ent of the clear testimony as to God's will which Jesus brings, 



FREDERICK W. BURNHAM 275 

there is no yielding to the sense of obligation, a man cannot be 
saved. The compulsion of responsibility will inevitably be 
felt when the proclamation of the gospel with its facts, com- 
mands and promises has been made. If a man resists this com- 
pulsion he does so at his own peril. Jesus said, "And this is 
condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men 
loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were 
evil." 

God has not conditioned man's salvation, as some have er- 
roneously supposed, upon a merely intellectual assent, or belief, 
but upon the response to duty with which the new belief ifc 
fraught. "Believes and is baptized" is the statement, and bap- 
tism is the beginning of obedience, — the joyful acceptance of 
the first new duty under Christ's leadership. In thus placing 
the hinge of men's salvation God has not made an arbitrary 
enactment, but has founded redemption upon an essential prin- 
ciple of our natures. He has not dealt with us as a Judge, but 
as a Father. Discriminate between the arbitrary and the essen- 
tial. The recent banishment of Paderewski from the territory 
of Russia, because he reminded the Czar that he is a Pole and 
not a Russian, was an arbitrary act. The Czar might have for- 
given him so slight an offense, he might, possibly, have had 
him beheaded. But if in employing a carpenter to build a 
house for me, I insist, however resolutely, that he accept and 
abide by the plans and specifications which I have drawn, else 
he cannot be my builder, the condition I impose is not arbi- 
trary, but essential. Without those plans he cannot build the 
house I want, however skilled he may be. If Moses would 
build a tabernacle suited to the divine ideal, he must accept 
and work out the pattern shown to him in the holy mount. So 
God commands us to accept his Son, not as an arbitrary enact- 
ment of Supreme Legislation, but as the essential condition of 
spiritual soul-building. "We must accept Him, and embody His 
spirit or salvation from sin is impossible. There will be no 
turning from sin, no resistance to its power, no striving for 
the higher life, unless man constantly yields to the compulsion 



276 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

of duty toward the Father, as revealed and exemplified in 
Jesus Christ. 

And this principle, you will see, applies not only to the mat- 
ter of primary obedience, but also to the whole process of the 
development of a godly life. It seems to me that this is what 
Paul meant when he wrote to the Galatians, "I travail in birth 
again until Christ be formed in you. ' ' He would have the sense 
of responsibility to do the will of Christ so urgent and effectual 
in them, that the doing of that will should become for them a 
new and second nature. 

This compulsion of responsibility is what gives to love its 
power, so that love becomes the fulfilling of the law. Without 
it love is a mere sentiment. With it love is the fullness of out- 
going life, active, potent, complete. Even Divine love felt the 
power of responsibility toward a perishing world and sent the 
Only Begotten Son to redeem it. It is of the highest importance 
that every Christian cultivate within himself this sense of, and 
habit of responding to the compulsive power of duty. 

As this compulsion of responsibility is the centripetal force 
of righteousness which binds the individual soul to God, so it is 
also the centrifugal force of missionary zeal which sends the 
redeemed man to carry the good news to others. When Jesus 
gave the great Commission to the disciples he prefaced the 
statement of their twofold duty with a sentence which would 
ever remind them of their responsibility to him. 

"All authority is given unto me, both in heaven and on earth, 
go ye therefore." 

The character of their preaching and their subsequent lives 
show the power which this truth exerted. St. Paul states it in 
his own experience, thus, "For if I preach the gospel, I have 
nothing to glory of; for necessity is laid upon me ; for woe is 
me if I preach not the gospel. For if I do this of mine own 
will, I have a reward ; but if not of mine own will, still I have 
a stewardship entrusted unto me." Whether he did his work 
willingly or unwillingly he could not escape his responsibility. 
He had been chosen to bear the good tidings unto the Gentiles, 
and no man can disobey God and be guiltless. If he willingly 



FREDERICK W. BURNHAM 277 

obeyed he had a reward in the consciousness of having done his 
duty; if not willingly he still had been entrusted with that 
task. 

In missionary activity the Christian's responsibility has a 
twofold aspect. First, as already indicated, necessity is 
laid upon him by the command of Christ, and by the confidence 
God has reposed in him as his co-worker. Says the apostle 
Paul, ''The love of Christ constraineth us." That is, the love 
of Christ shuts us up to this one thing, so that we must do it. 
But there is another phase of the Christian's duty. In Troas 
Paul saw in a vision a man of Macedonia, saying, ' ' Come over 
into Macedonia and help us. ' ' Writing to the Romans he says, 
"I am debtor both to the Greeks and to the barbarians, to the 
wise and to the foolish." This, too, is a debt of responsibility. 
It is interpreted later in the same letter when he writes, "We 
that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and 
not to please ourselves." In this matter of bearing the truth to 
others there is not only the Master's voice behind us; but also 
our brother's cry before us. Love, gratitude to Christ, respect 
for his authority, on the one hand; and the debt of strength 
to weakness, of ability to need on the other, constitute the two 
elements of responsibility for the promulgation of the gospel 
which should be felt by every disciple of Christ. It is here 
that our fellowship with Christ in doing the work of the Father 
that sent him really begins. Cannot we say with him, ' ' We must 
work while it is day?" 

Now to return to the words of Jesus where we discovered the 
expression of his own sense of responsibility, we find there two 
further expressions embodying ideas that give added impetus 
to this moral sense. They are needed in the full exercise of this 
power. "I must work the work of Him that sent me while it 
is day; the night cometh when no man can work." First, the 
shortness of our time for work. "While it is day." To men 
who are accustomed, as you are, to look at life in its serious 
aspects I need no more than mention this truth. You have felt 
the force of St. Paul's statement, "Brethren the time is short." 
I only suggest that this thought should beget in us no useless 



278 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

sentiment, but help us only to redouble our energies in life's 
worthy work. Second, the certain limit of our work. "The 
night cometh when no man can work." Whatever else death 
may have in store for us, brethren, this much is certain, that it 
will bring to an end the opportunity of our participation in af- 
fairs here, and will conclude our efforts to finish life's work. 
Our responsibility is within these limits. 

An incident in my experience as a telegraph operator gave 
new emphasis to this truth. I give it here with the hope that its 
message may justify its use. 

The eastbound passenger train on the Rocky Mountain di- 
vision of the Northern Pacific railroad, due at Clough Junc- 
tion, half way down the mountain grade from Mullen Pass to 
Helena, at about 8 o'clock p. m. was one summer night about 
two hours late. Being a transcontinental train carrying the 
Government mails, it was important that as much as possible 
of this time be made up. The track was cleared by the dis- 
patcher 's orders and a special schedule of high speed issued for 
this train. We were all anxious and eager to see the results. 
We listened attentively to the clicking of the instruments on 
our table, as one after another of the operators up the line 
reported the train by their stations. Up the grade on the other 
side the divide the train was struggling heroically, keeping to 
the schedule and steadily whitling down the time. Then the 
summit was passed and down the grade at a livelier pace she 
plunged. Presently the clicking indicated that Butler had 
been reached, — the next station above our own, — only four 
miles away. The night operator and I stepped out on the 
platform to see the train come. As we did so we could hear, 
as of distant thunder, the echoing roar of her wheels. Then 
a flash like a meteor darted across the darkened west, as the 
train shot out of one tunnel, across dizzy, curving trestles, and 
into another. As she came into sight again we could see that, 
the retainers being set, which applies a precautionary pressure 
of four pounds to the square inch on the wheels, the sparks 
were flying from the brakes so that the train seemed to travel 
on a bed of stars. Rounding the mountain-side immediately 



FREDERICK W. BURNHAM 279 

above us her light flashed along the rails as she headed down 
the straight piece of track that passed our station. On she 
came, thundering, swaying, plunging, almost leaping, as, spurn- 
ing the grade with her whirling wheels, she flew toward her 
destination. Instinctively we stepped inside the door to avoid 
the rushing tempest, and in an instant she had passed and was 
lost from view around the curve below. 

The next day the engineer who pulled that train stopped at 
my station going up the mountain. Speaking of the run of the 
night before, I asked him if he wasn't afraid at making such 
terrific speed down those dangerous mountain grades. His 
reply I shall never forget. " Afraid, boy," said he, ''afraid! 
"Why I hadn't any time to be afraid, when we went by here we 
had six minutes to make Helena, seven miles away, and we had 
to get there ! ' ' 

Brethren, servants of the Living God, engineers of the gospel 
train, the schedule of our speed is high, God's track is clear, 
the limit is set, there is no time to lose or be afraid. Our 
supreme duty is to get there. 



J. J. HALEY 

n^HE subject of this sketch occupied a sort of midway position between 
*- the preachers of the old "Living Pulpit" and those of the present 
volume. He is worthy to represent both classes. 

J. J. Haley was born in Rockcastle County, Ky., March 18, 1851. Was 
raised in Clark County on a farm near Winchester. Born in the moun- 
tains and brought up in the Blue Grass, a good combination of natal 
circumstances. He was educated in the common schools of the two 
counties, in Kentucky University, and North Western Christian Uni- 
versity, of Indianapolis, now Butler College. Mr. Haley holds an M.A. 
degree from Kentucky University. 

After preaching a year in Mississippi, was married to Miss Lizzie 
Clark April 13, 1874, in Woodford County, Ky., and started the next day 
for Australia. On May 27 Mr. Haley and his wife reached Sydney, New 
South Wales, and labored there with fair success for more than two 
years. In, September, 1876, removed to Dunedin, New Zealand, and for 
over two years preached there for a large and flourishing church. A call 
coming from the Lygon St. church at Melbourne, Australia, the pioneer 
church of our Brotherhood in the Southern Hemisphere, Mr. Haley ac- 
cepted, and for six years preached and did there, perhaps, the greatest 
work of his life- In the spring of 1885 he returned to the United States, 
preaching a year for the First church in San Francisco. Then two years 
at Midway, Ky. After spending the next two years in editorial work 
in St. Louis, in 1890 he went to England under the Foreign Christian Mis- 
sionary Society where he labored for five years. Returning to the U. S. 
he began a nine year ministry at Cynthiana, Ky. The work at this place 
was very successful and a new stone church was built during Mr. Haley's 
pastorate. From Cynthiana, he removed to Richmond, Va., where he 
remained for over four years, retiring at the age of 57 and practically 
ending his pastoral ministry. He now lives at Acampo, Cal., near Lodi, 
where he is helping the weak churches as opportunity offers. He resided 
for a short time in Eustis, Fla., and preached for the church while there. 

Mr. Haley has had a varied journalistic experience, being assistant 
editor of the Australian Christian Pioneer of Adelaide, South Australia; 
editor and founder of The Australian Christian Watchman, in Melbourne; 
co-editor of the Apostolic Guide, Louisville, Ky.; office editor of The 
Christian-Evangelist, St. Louis, and also contributing editor for a long 
time; editor-in-chief of the Christian Oracle and Christian Century, Chi- 
cago; editor of the Christian Monthly, Richmond, Va. ; and assistant editor 

281 



282 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

of The, New Christian Quarterly and a few other minor papers. He has 
also written a few books and contributed to many more. 

In 1915, the church at Melbourne, Australia, called Mr. Haley back 
to their jubilee celebration, paying all his expenses and a goodly sum 
besides. This mark of esteem, after thirty-one years of absence, to- 
gether with the evident extent and permanence of the work he had done 
there, well repaid Mr. Haley for all his efforts. 

As will be seen, Mr. Haley has had a wide experience as a preacher. A 
great many preachers are unable to see the world; and yet the best school- 
ing is that received by travel. Mr. Haley has gained breadth by his 
travels; and yet no preacher among the Disciples is more firmly anchored 
to the fundamental principles of their religious movement, and few, if 
any, understand the movement better than does he. 

As a preacher, he has too much brains to be popular with certain 
"two by four" critics; but he is a thinker rather than an elocutionist, 
and with thoughtful hearers, his message is always well received. His 
sermons are characterized by striking and forceful generalizations. As 
it has been said of him, "He preaches chunks." He recognizes that 
great sermons are not the result of spontaneous combustion, but come 
from the furnace of profound thinking and prayerful meditation. He dis- 
cards entirely the notion that preaching is specially intended for the en- 
tertainment of the audience, or is mainly for the education of the audi- 
ence, but holds strongly the conviction that preaching is for the saving 
of the audience. This conviction compels him to make very earnest work 
of his pulpit deliverances. He certainly gives no hospitality to unseemly 
catch word or references, for the purpose of gaining the attention of 
his hearers. He believes that the gospel is the power of God unto 
salvation, and is content to preach it as a very serious message. 

Socially he is a delightful companion. The editor of this volume has 
had the best of opportunity, in both this country and Europe, to know, 
and he states that the Disciples have few, if any, abler preachers among 
them than J. J. Haley. He is evangelical, but not sectarian, liberal but 
not latitudinarian, progressive but always true to Christian principles. 




%X^~f4^L^ 





IDEALS OF THE LORD'S PRAYER 

By J. J. Haley 
Text.— Matt. 6:9-13. 

WHEN Martin Luther came upon a passage of Scripture 
of peculiar significance and great wealth of meaning, 
he called it "a little Bible." The Lord's prayer is the greatest 
of "The Little Bibles" of Revelation, because it compresses 
into a few sentences, the entire substance of the big Bible itself. 
Never, perhaps, in the history of human language, has such an 
inexhaustible mine of thought and suggestion been expressed 
in the same number of words. From a literary point of view, it is 
a gem of purest ray serene. As literature simply, without refer- 
ence to its unique religious value and importance, it is unsur- 
passed in the annals of expression. From a theological view 
point, it presents to us the highest conception of God, and the 
reign of God, in the souls of men. From the standpoint of 
ethics and moral philosophy its ideals of human life, under the 
reign of heaven, are absolutely perfect. If we view it histori- 
cally and socially, and were able to think of its petitions an- 
swered, its sentiments realized in the affairs of men, its truths 
incarnated in the life of divine society. The new heaven and 
the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness, would surely be 
upon us, in full force. From the devotional and spiritual point 
of view, it is the essence and strength of the soul's food con- 
densed into a prayer. Like a masterpiece of art, the more you 
look at it the more you see in it. From whatever angle of 
vision we contemplate it, it is a marvelous composition, a little 
Bible of surpassing depth and power. Let us study, for a few 
moments, some of its more striking ideals. 

283 



284 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

II. 

It Is An Ideal Prayer 

Its ideal characteristics are seen chiefly in contrast to the 
orthodox devotions of the period. Whether the Pharisees of 
our Lord's time, like some of the evangelical churches of our 
day, made in their leading service, a little prayer and a big 
one, a short prayer and a long one, when the short prayer 
covered the ground, and the long one was a weariness to the 
flesh, by its much speaking; or whether like the Roman Catholic 
and Anglican establishments, they had a multitude of little 
prayers, written, stereotyped, and repeated, world without 
end, we do not know. It is more likely, however, from intima- 
tions we have on the subject, that these religious guides of the 
people, traveled in their prayers from Dan to Beersheba, from 
Genesis to Malachi, from Tartarus to Abraham's bosom, and 
that their prayers were more theological than religious, more 
formal than devotional, more intellectual than spiritual, more 
rhetorical than simple, more numerous than necessary. In 
opposition to the pharisaic notion of that day and this, our 
Lord taught his disciples to make their petitions brief, simple, 
spiritual, devotional, comprehensive. In point of brevity, sim- 
plicity, spirituality, purity of style, and an all-embracing com- 
prehensiveness of petition, this prayer is the most marvelous 
on record. There is nothing like it in the literature of devotion. 
No human production could ever carry with it such a weight 
of meaning in such a compass of words, or live so long, or be 
repeated so often, without becoming outworn and obsolete. 
Out of the 66 words of which the prayer is composed, 51 are 
monosyllables, 11 have two syllables and only three have more 
than two. How marvelously brief and simple ! How free from 
ostentation and rhetorical display! What an ocean of spirit- 
uality in a few drops of words ! What expansive thought, what 
range of petition, what far-reaching aspirations couched in 
80 syllables of human speech. So simple that a child can lisp 
it understandingly at its mother's knee, and so profound and 
comprehensive as to baffle the intellect of a Sage. 



J. J. HALEY 285 

There is nothing in the whole range of petition, nothing in 
the multiplied catalogue of human wants, nothing in the spirit 
of Jesus, nothing in the revelation of God, nothing of promise 
or blessing, wisdom or glory, in the inspirations of both Testa- 
ments, not expressed or distinctly and necessarily implied in 
this wonderful prayer our Savior taught his disciples to pray. 
If these petitions were fully answered in the realizations of our 
Christian experience, would there be anything left to pray for? 
If the primal truth of revelation, the Fatherhood of God, and 
its correlatives, the sonship and brotherhood of man, were 
thoroughly understood and practically accepted; if God were 
worshiped in the spirit of reverence and consecration; if the 
soul were in the kingdom of God and the kingdom of God in 
the soul, so that the will of God would be done on earth as it is 
in heaven; if our daily wants and earthly needs, physical and 
temporal were all supplied; if we forgave the sins of others as 
God in the mystery of his love has forgiven our sins; if the 
peril of temptation was passed and a perfect salvation had de- 
livered us from evil, and through all this and in it, we could 
gratefully ascribe the kingdom, and the power and the glory 
to God, what would be left to ask of our Father in prayer? 
And all this our Divine Lord expressed in 66 words, made up 
of 80 syllables, with only a half minute of time required to 
offer it. No wonder Edward Irvine could deliver it in 30 sec- 
onds with such impressive and stirring solemnity as to bring 
tears to the eyes of his auditors. This petition that welled up 
from the heart of Jesus is luminously ideal and worthy of imi- 
tation in the five elements that characterize its composition; 
brevity, simplicity, spirituality, catholicity, comprehensiveness. 

III. 

Its Basic Elements Contain an Ideal Creed 

There is a confessional import and creedal significance in the 
Lord's Prayer, not generally understood by those who make 
such free use of it, in their public devotions. There is of course 
an obvious distinction between a statement of belief and a form 
of prayer. But the substance of belief is the basis from which 



286 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

the material of prayer is drawn, so that it is quite impossible 
for a man to pray intelligently without telling what he be- 
lieves, and if he tells what he believes, he is stating his creed, 
either in express terms, or by necessary implication. The 
prayer of the devout man is always his confession of faith. 
There is abundant historic justification for this holy mixture 
of creed and prayer. The Anglican and Roman Catholic litur- 
gies repeat the Lord's Prayer and the Apostles' creed in every 
service, and they are both incorporated as part of the worship. 
The old divines all mixed theology with their prayers, and 
not infrequently in the long prayer of the service, they preached 
a theological system as long as the moral law. It was some- 
times difficult to tell whether these ancient theologians were 
preaching prayers or praying sermons. As a sample of his 
class, I heard an old Presbyterian divine in the bush country 
of Australia, pray thirty-five minutes by a good timepiece, and 
I could scarcely tell whether he was praying a creed or creeding 
a prayer ; for in that mortal half hour and five minutes he got 
in all the Calvinism he was able to master, be boiled down, for 
the benefit of his long suffering congregation, the two cate- 
chisms long and short, the Westminster confession, Calvin's 
Institutes, and the "Five Points" were given in bulk. The 
mistake of the old gentleman, aside from the length of his per- 
formance, was not in the mixture of creed and prayer, but in 
the fact that neither creed nor prayer were modeled after the 
inspired ideal before us. Although not expressly intended as 
a creed but as a form of devotion, a devotional form, neverthe- 
less, as we have seen, must contain the substance of religion, 
and hence there is not a finer summary and exposition of the 
fundamental principles and verities of the Christian religion 
than this prayer contains. 

As to form and meaning a model creed must possess at least 
six characteristics: 1, brief; 2, simple; 3, intelligible; 4, spirit- 
ual; 5, Catholic; 6, comprehensive. 

As to substance of doctrine an acceptable religious creed 
must deal in a satisfactory way, with these propositions: 

1. Concerning God — who he is, what he is, where he is. 



J. J. HALEY 287 

2. Concerning worship — its nature and spirit. 

3. Concerning the kingdom of God, the reign of righteous- 
ness. 

4. Concerning the will of God — the law of the kingdom. 

5. Concerning the providence of God in the supply of our 
daily wants. 

6. Concerning the forgiveness of sins — divine and human. 

7. Concerning salvation as involved in the temptations of 
life and the way of deliverance from evil forces. 

8. Concerning the outcome and final victory of all that a 
divine religion is intended to accomplish, the kingdom and 
power and the glory ascribed to God. 

Human creeds usually deal with theological speculations, 
doctrinal distinctions, and metaphysical disquisitions, and 
rarely with the kingdom of God and its righteousness. See 
how unlike the typical human creed this one is, and how ad- 
mirably it covers the ground of the inspired creedal statement, 
of the cardinal principles of a divine revelation. 

1. All about God, "Our Father, who art in heaven." 

2. All about worship, "Hallowed be thy name." 

3. All about the kingdom of God, his reign in the heart and 
over the minds of men, "Thy Kingdom Come." 

4. All about the will of God, which is the rule of life and the 
law of the kingdom, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in 
heaven. ' ' 

5. All about providence, "Give us this day our bread for to- 
morrow. ' ' 

6. All about the forgiveness of sins, "Forgiveness of sins, 
as we forgive those who sin against us. ' ' 

7. All about God's deliverance of his people from the allur- 
ing and encompassing evils of the world, "Lead us not into 
temptation, but deliver us from evil." 

8. All about the obligation and privilege of praise, "For 
thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. 
Amen. ' ' 

With slight changes of phraseology this prayer our Lord 
taught his disciples to repeat and imitate, could be changed into 



288 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

a creed on which all Christians could unite without any sacri- 
fice of truth or conscience: I believe in the Fatherhood of God. 
I believe in heaven, the home of God. I believe in the worship 
of God. I believe in the kingdom of God. I believe in the will 
of God. I believe in the moral and social order that obtains in 
heaven. I believe in the overruling providence that supplies 
our daily needs. I believe in the forgiveness of sins. I believe 
in the divine salvation that emancipates us from the thraldom 
of evil. I believe in the benediction that inspires universal 
praise. The kingdom, the power and the glory, must be 
ascribed to God. 

What more could a true and helpful creed contain, unless it 
be an explicit statement of the fact of Jesus Christ, his per- 
sonality and power to save. But Christ is the author of this 
creed, and his wisdom shines in every word of it. It is his 
own interpretation of the religion he came to reveal and of 
which he himself is the personal manifestation. A little fur- 
ther on, we shall come upon the astonishing truth, not hitherto 
considered, as far as I know, that this prayer is the spiritual 
and moral portraiture of Jesus Christ, the exact literary im- 
press of his faultless character. As it is, we have gone far 
enough to learn that this divine form of devotion is one of the 
most complete and perfect expositions of the religion of Christ 
that could be expressed in the same number of words. It would 
be hard to conceive of a more illuminating and compelling illus- 
tration of the simplicity of the Christian creed than is found in 
the small collection of monosyllabic terms assembled in the 
Lord's Prayer. 

I once heard a returned missionary tell of the extreme dif- 
ficulty of getting the heathen mind to comprehend and lay hold 
of the sentiments of the gospel. He had an appointment, on 
one occasion, to preach to a little group of savages, who had 
never heard the story of the Cross. For some time he was 
greatly puzzled where to begin or what to say. Finally, after 
much reflection and some agitation, he concluded, as the Lord's 
Prayer was perhaps the most comprehensive and representa- 
tive of the spirit and teaching of Jesus Christ of any other 



J. J. HALEY 289 

portions of Scripture, within convenient limits for treatment, 
he would expound that, in the simplest manner possible, to the 
untutored minds before him. He told them about the great 
Father in heaven, and all men being his children, and how it 
was the duty and the privilege of men to hold such a great and 
good being in profoundest reverence, and holiest veneration, 
how he had sent his Son to establish a kingdom in which all 
men were brothers, who loved each other, and all the rest of 
mankind; and how that even the temporal necessities of life, 
such as food and raiment were the gifts of this heavenly- 
Father, who was willing always to bestow his bounties, if they 
would ask him. At this point they stopped the missionary to 
hold a consultation among themselves. They returned and said, 
"Teacher, we like your doctrine; we are pleased to learn that 
there is a great Father who lives in heaven, of whom we are 
all children, and we are particularly struck with the idea that 
he will furnish us bread." "Go on missionary," they said, 
"Give us more teaching like that." The preacher went on to 
explain the petition concerning forgiveness. He told them 
that all hatreds and all enmities must be expelled from the 
heart, and as the great Father forgave his children who of- 
fended against him, they must learn to forgive one another, 
and that love must take the place of malice and peace be sub- 
stituted for war. They listened attentively and drew aside for 
another consultation. Their deliberations, this time, were 
brief and they returned with the unanimous verdict that this 
doctrine of forgiveness was impossible. Their spokesman said, 
"Teacher, we cannot receive that idea. We cannot go with 
you there. You white men may be able to practice that doc- 
trine, but we cannot. If we forgave our enemies they would 
not forgive us, and that would put us at a disadvantage." The 
missionary insisted. He told them that the substance of the 
whole thing lay in this, that unless they ceased to hate and 
fight, and learned to love and forgive, they could not please the 
great spirit or be happy in the world to come. "Well, 
teacher," they said, "you are a wise man, you know what is 
right. We suppose the thing you insist on is proper enough, 



290 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

where you came from, but we cannot forgive our enemies and 
those who injure us, and if you knew our enemies as we do, 
you wouldn't expect us to do it, either.'' 

Now those barbarians caught on to the essential feature of 
the Christ idea of human life, as delineated in his prayer, the 
creed was plain enough even to the savage intellect, but in the 
simplicity of their savage hearts they had the candor to say that 
they declined to practice it, because it was too hard. Alas, 
that civilized and even Christianized humanity should be wrest- 
ling with still with this unconquered principle with but little 
better promise of victory than his savage brother. Whether we 
sing the Lord's Prayer as a chant, recite it as a creed, or repeat 
it as a prayer, or believe it as a theology, its intellectual prob- 
lems are not difficult to solve, but when we come to the moral 
and social problem of reducing its spirit and meaning to a 
practical reality in human life, both savage and civilized men 
strike the supreme difficulty of a vital acceptance of the gospel. 
The missionary, however, was moved by a true instinct, if not 
by a special inspiration, to select the Lord's Prayer as the best 
text for a simple and comprehensive exposition of the religion 
of Christ. 

IV 

The Lord's Prayer contains, in outline, an ideal theology. 
Theology is religion in terms of the understanding. A man's 
conception of the personality and character of God, and his 
relations to the universe, in terms of the intellect, constitutes 
the sum and substance of his theology. All efforts to explain 
God and the mutual relationships between God and man, are 
theological interpretations of religion. The declaration of Sam 
Jones that he loved religion and hated theology is as unintelli- 
gent as if he had said that he loved flowers and hated botany. 
Botany is the science of flowers as theology is the science of 
religion. Every man with intellect enough to think is a theo- 
logical student, for necessarily he must form to himself some 
kind of conception of God and that conception is his theology. 
The assertion of Dr. Hatch that an ethical sermon stands in the 
forefront of New Testament Christianity, and a metaphysi- 



J. J. HALEY 291 

cal creed in the forefront of the Christianity of the fourth cen- 
tury is relatively true, when the central point of contrast is 
emphasized, but not exhaustively true as a matter of fact. 
That other statement of the learned Doctor that the Sermon on 
the Mount has no metaphysics and the Nicene Creed no ethics, 
belong to the same category. If Hatch metaphysics includes 
philosophy and theology, as it clearly does, the Sermon on the 
Mount literally bristles with theological presuppositions from 
beginning to end. In fact the ethics of the sermon find their 
root in Christ's doctrine of God. If there was nothing in the 
Sermon on the Mount but the Lord's Prayer, it would be one 
of the most distinctively theological documents on record. The 
word theology is made up of theos God, and ology a discourse, 
literally a discourse about God, giving expression to a concep- 
tion of the life and character of God. In this sense that won- 
derful prayer our Lord taught his disciples to pray is shot 
through and through with theological sense, the sense of the 
truth of God and God's relations to man. 

Notice, please, how every clause and every sentence, both 
invocation and petition, center in God, and radiate the truth 
from him: Father God, name of God, worship of God, home 
of God, will of God, kingdom of God, providence of God, for- 
giveness of God, emancipation or salvation of God from the 
evil forces of life, the kingdom, power, glory and praise of God. 
Could more be said of God and his relations to man in the same 
number of words? 

The term " Father" is Christ's interpretation of the nature 
and character of God. The Fatherhood of God is the imperial 
and mountain truth of revealed religion, through Jesus Christ, 
from which five great rivers of life flow down to water the 
human soul. 

1. Incarnation and revelation. Because God is my Father 
he puts himself into communication with me ; he reveals himself 
to me, not only in words, but in and through the incarnate 
personality of his Son, who became the equivalent of God to 
my soul in ways and words that I can understand. 

2. The second river that gushes out at the base of this moun- 



292 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

tain truth of God's Fatherhood, is the river of salvation, 
because God is my Father and I am his Son. He stretches out 
his hands to save me, and this is my only hope of salvation. 

3. The third stream that emanates from the mountain truth 
of the divine Fatherhood, is man's moral and spiritual likeness 
to God, known as righteousness and Christian character. If 
the child partakes of the moral nature of his Father, he must 
partake also of his moral character. The ethical law, the rule 
of righteousness that governs the conduct of our Father, God, 
must govern the conduct of his children. 

4. The fourth river that flows from this mountain truth of 
revelation, is human brotherhood. An obvious corollary of 
the Fatherhood of God is the brotherhood of man. If God is 
my Father and I am his Son, I am a brother to every man in 
the world, and every man in the world is a brother to me. One 
of the first inferences that Christ drew from the Fatherly rela- 
tions of God and his infinite love for the children of men, and 
the one for which he sacrificed himself on the Cross, the union 
of all who love in the service of all who suffer, is the last one 
we will comprehend or learn to apply. 

5. The fifth river of life that flows from the mountain range 
of God's Fatherhood is the river of immortality. Because God, 
my Father, lives forever, he has given me his Son, the power 
of an endless life. If the power of a human parent was equal 
to his love he would not allow one of his children to die. God's 
power is equal to his love, therefore he will not allow his chil- 
dren to die. The great argument for immortality is the love of 
God for those who are his. 

Following this one word Father in the invocation, and its 
vast implications in the revelation of God and the conduct of 
human life, are specification in detail, of the way in which 
these truths focalize in human experience. 

1. Keverent and holy and consecrated adoration of God. 

2. The expression and organization of spiritual life in the 
kingdom of God. 

3. The law of life, the will of God, the reproduction on earth 



J. J. HALEY 293 

of the social order of heaven, "Thy will be done on earth as it 
is in heaven.' ' 

4. The law of providence for the sustenance of human life. 

5. The law of reconciliation between God and man, and be- 
tween man and man. In the first the human person repents 
and the Divine person forgives; in the second the human sin- 
ner repents and the sinned against pardons. 

6. The law of salvation, redemption and liberation from evil 
forces that encompass the soul, and the passion for perfect holi- 
ness that takes the place of sin. 

7. The culmination of the redemptive process in universal 
praise, ' ' For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory 
for ever. Amen." 

V 

Let us study this inspired composition, in the fourth place, 
as an ideal representation of character, or as the literary ex- 
pression of an ideal man. This document is first a prayer, then 
a creed, and then a life-sized photograph of the personal char- 
acter of Jesus Christ. What I mean to say is that the Lord 
Jesus Christ in his personal life and character is the incarna- 
tion of the truths and principles expressed in this prayer. 
Translate the contents into thought and you have a perfect 
creed; translate them into life and you have a perfect char- 
acter, realized in its absolute completeness only in Christ. This 
is, therefore, a model prayer, a practical creed, and when both 
are applied to life, a perfect character. You see a picture sus- 
pended from the wall, underneath it is the name and a verbal 
description. Christ is the picture that shines through his 
prayer of which the words are but a verbal delineation. Let 
us see if there is not a perfect character depicted here. There 
are seven spirits represented in this divine composition and 
they are seven spirits of God, the sacred number that denotes 
perfection: 

1. The filial spirit, "Our Father which art in heaven." 

2. The reverential spirit, ' ' Hallowed be thy name. ' ' 

3. The missionary spirit, "Thy kingdom come." 



294 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

4. The obedient spirit, "Thy will be done in earth as it is 
in heaven." 

5. The trustful spirit, "Give us this day our daily bread." 

6. The forgiving spirit, "Forgive us our trespasses as we for- 
give them that trespass against us." 

7. The spirit of holiness, "Lead us not into temptation but 
deliver us from evil." 

8. And if the doxology were included an eighth might be 
added if it were distinguishable from the rest, the spirit of 
praise, ' ' For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory 
forever and forever. Amen." 

Embody these seven spirits in a human personality and you 
have Jesus Christ — as he was in the days of his incarnate life. 
Tell me, if a man have the beautiful filial spirit of Jesus 
blooming in his heart, distilled as the odor of sweet flowers in 
his life, so that his very presence is a benediction, because he 
recognizes and realizes that God is his Father and that he is 
God's Son, and that all men high and low, great and small, 
are his brothers in the bonds of a divine human sympathy; if 
he be endowed with the reverential spirit which holds in deep- 
est reverence, in awful sacredness, the name and the person 
of God, who never takes that name in vain, in either flippancy 
or profanity; if he have the missionary spirit, the philanthropic, 
man-loving, world-embracing sympathy, that yearns and prays 
and labors and gives that the reign of God may be established 
in every heart, and in all the earth ; if there be given to him the 
spirit of obedience and loyalty, of submission and resignation, 
so that in all the circumstances and providences of life, his 
supreme desire is "Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven;" 
if he be characterized by the spirit of dependence and trust- 
fulness, realizing that his sufficiency is of God, that all things 
temporal as well as spiritual come from the Father's hand in 
whom we live and move and have our being ; if he be inspired 
by the spirit of forgiveness, and has put on as the elect of God, 
holy and beloved, a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, 
meekness, long-suffering, forebearing and forgiving others, if 



J. J. HALEY 295 

he have a complaint against any, even as God for Christ's sake 
hath forgiven him. * * * * 

If there be in him the spirit of purity and conse- 
cration that longs for freedom from sin and perfection in 
holiness and to crown all the spirit of thanksgiving and praise, 
the ascription of all to God, "For thine is the kingdom and 
the glory and the power forever. Amen" — if a man have all 
this, if he possesses all these characteristics, what is he? A 
Christian? Yes, he is more than a Christian; he is a Christ. 
He has, in all its majesty and fullness the blessing of perfect 
manhood that Christ came to impart and to inspire in the 
largest of human souls. We have here the most perfect pic- 
ture of Christ that even inspired language can represent. 
What more of prayer, creed, theology or character could be 
found than these brief petitions contain? When you repeat 
this wonderful prayer, if you enter into its meaning, your 
soul sweeps round an immense and measureless circle of bless- 
ing. Truly its comprehensiveness and exhaustiveness and 
kaleidoscopic many-sidedness are amazing in view of its extreme 
brevity and simplicity and bespeak a depth, length and width of 
meaning that only the highest form of inspiration can reach. 
Lessons: 1. Pray in the spirit and manner the Lord teaches in 
this model. 2. Make the truth and teaching of this prayer the 
practical, every-day and all-day creed of your life. 3. Above 
all make it the ideal of character to which you constantly and 
passionately endeavor to rise. The result will be the Christ 
life of moral and spiritual perfectness, for Christianity in its 
last analysis and in its first, is the reproduction of the life of 
Christ in our lives. 



R. H. CROSSFIELD 

T~\ E. CEOSSFIELD is regarded as perhaps the best equipped of our 
■*- , College Presidents, who are active in both the pulpit and college 
work. One cannot be in his presence long until he feels the atmosphere 
of business, and in this respect he is well qualified for an executive posi- 
tion in college affairs. He is also equally at home in the pulpit, and his 
college work has in no respect diminished his love for preaching the 
Gospel, and no vacation from college duties can keep him out of the pul- 
pit when a favorable opportunity offers. He must be busy at something 
and preaching is his favorite recreation. 

He was born near Lawrenceburg, Ky., October 22, 1868. Attended 
elementary and secondary schools at home. 

Graduated with A.B. degree from Transylvania College; graduated from 
College of the Bible; made M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in "University of 
Wooster; received LL.D. from Georgetown College. From this record 
it will be seen he has not failed to equip himself academically for his 
great life work. 

Taught in Lawrenceburg, Ky., one year; principal Harrodsburg, Ky., 
Classical and English Academy two years. 

Minister Glasgow, Ky., Christian church four years; minister Owens- 
boro, Ky., Christian church thirteen years. It was here that his executive 
abilities and power as a preacher became conspicuous. The church under 
his care grew into one of the leading churches of the state, and has 
continued to grow up to the present time, illustrating the important 
fact that his work is not of the ephemeral kind. 

Married Annie E. Terry, of Glasgow, Ky. 

Installed president Transylvania College, 1908; installed president Col- 
lege of the Bible 1912, both of which positions he now holds. As an 
educator he has been eminently successful. During his administration 
the work of these colleges has grown to encouraging proportions. 

During his connection with Transylvania and the College of the Bible 
more than $400,000 has been raised for endowment and equipment. Col- 
lege plant improved, faculty enlarged, and courses of study extended. 

Held a large number of evangelistic meetings while in the pastorate; 
traveled in Europe, Asia, Africa, Central America, Mexico, Alaska, etc. 

Author of "Pilgrimages of a Parson," and "The Christian Principle 
of Sociology.' ' 

297 



298 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

As a preacher Dr. Crossfield succeeds either as pastor or evangelist. 
As an evangelist he is a connecting link between the Old Evangelism and 
the Evangelism of the present day. He avoids the sensational methods 
of some, but believes in legitimate, organized efforts of all the available 
church forces in the proclamation of the gospel. 




Fraternally yours, 



fffiL-L*. 



~> 



THE MEASURE OF MAN 

By R. H. Crossfield 

Text. — "But now abideth faith, hope, love, these three; and the 
greatest of these is love." — Cor. 13:13. 

IT is generally accepted as a fact that we possess no definite 
knowledge as to how long the human race has existed. 
Revelation nowhere furnishes this information, nor does it 
supply the slightest foundation for a conjecture. Science de- 
clares that it traces evidences of human life back millions of 
years, yet it nowhere gives an unqualified answer to the 
inquiry. 

But whether mankind has lived on the earth six thousand 
or six million years, all will agree that ample time has elapsed 
for the development of a competent standard by which to 
measure a man. We may go a step further. If all the genera- 
tions anteceding the present one were obliterated root and 
branch, we would still have abundant data by which to answer 
the question raised, "What are the outstanding values of life, 
what is the measure of man?" 

"Moreover, is not the experience of a single individual 
abundantly sufficient for this purpose? Each human life is 
not a detached, or independent unit, but an epitome — a re- 
sume of all that has gone before, — so that when we study with 
minute care an individual, we are brought face to face with 
the salient characteristics of the race. 

Many, however, do not properly appraise the values of life. 
Just as the physician, who knows the malignant influences of 
opiates on the system, does not always exercise self control, 
and as the teacher, versed in the principles and art of pedagogy, 
does not invariably practice what he preaches, so men fre- 
quently fail to live up to the best of their knowledge and op- 
portunities with respect to the highest purposes of life. 



300 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

We are not, therefore, altogether surprised to discover that 
the ordinary, everyday man does not constantly apply the 
wisdom of the ages to his life, does not clearly see the things 
that should challenge his supreme purpose in their proper per- 
spective, and that he does not always succeed in putting first 
things first. 

It is with the hope that you young people, whose program has 
not yet become permanently and rigidly defined, may be led to 
act with discretion and judgment that I speak on the subject 
announced. Moreover, I wish to emphasize the fact that the 
standards which you now choose by which to measure a suc- 
cessful life will largely determine your future. It is most nec- 
essary, therefore, that your ideal — that upon which your eye is 
fixed — should be right, for if your purpose is less lofty than 
the highest, if your eye is not set upon the noblest goals, you 
will certainly fall short of the best attainments. 

Speaking negatively, and employing the process of elimina- 
tion, permit me to say that the true measure of man is not found 
in the realm of physical attainment. 

Do not understand me to underestimate or discourage proper 
attention to the science of body building. This is a funda- 
mental duty. To become physically able and efficient, is among 
the first of the first things earnestly to be sought. 

You have heard it said, I presume, that there is coming a 
time when to be sick will constitute a disgrace. Whether that 
prophecy be realized or not, the day will be when the physician 
who practices will largely be supplanted by the physician who 
prevents. Prophylaxis will be the order of the day, and, like 
our Chinese contemporaries, we will pay our physician to keep 
us well, and not to cure us when sick. An ounce of prevention 
has always been worth many pounds of cure. 

Such health is necessary to the largest happiness. When 
Alexander Pope observed, 

"All pride of reason, all joy of sense, 
Lies in three words — health, peace, and competence, ' ' 

he expressed a profound truth. Health enables us to enjoy 



K. H. CROSSFIELD 301 

work, and leisure, and home, and study, and travel, and all the 
beauties, duties, and recreations of life. 

Good health enables us to be efficient. However attractive 
the songs of Milton and Homer, however eloquent the 
preaching of Bossuet, however remarkable the culture of Helen 
Keller, it is manifest that the world has lost much by reason 
of their blindness. So with any physical defect, whether it 
be that of the loss of one of the senses, or the impairment 
of health. 

Have you considered what we lose in productivity on account 
of ill health? Dr. J. W. Jenks, of Cornell University, estimates 
that the sickness of the American people costs us one and a 
quarter billion dollars annually, and that each member of our 
population loses, on an average, 13 days a year as a consequence 
of physical impairment. 

Therefore, all honor to the man who develops his physical 
potentialities, who grows into symmetrical manhood. 

Nor do I fail properly to evaluate physical beauty. The 
most attractive sight in the world is a human face — the cheeks 
glowing with health, the eyes beaming with intelligence, the 
lips expressive of love, the brow crowned with dignity and 
honor. Personal beauty should be cultivated, and all the graces 
and charms of face and feature should be wooed and won. 
To this end, the human form should be attired tastefully and 
becomingly, so that beauty and attractiveness in every way 
may be emphasized. 

But the large meaning of life is not to be found in physical 
health and strength and beauty. Such accessories do not abide. 
These bodies of ours, despite the care we give them, will soon 
dissolve into the elements — return to the dust whence they 
came — and become " brother to the insensible rock and the 
sluggish clod." These temples we live in, so "express and 
admirable," will one day become ghastly and repulsive. No 
discovery of science has ever prevented ultimate dissolution. 
The kings of Egypt, with their wonderful tomb-pyramids and 
their art of embalming, could not effectually forestall decay. 



302 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Even these pyramids have been fatally scarred by the tooth of 
time, and the mummies they contained scattered to the winds. 

Nor is the true measure of life found in accumulated treasure. 
I would not inveigh against the outstanding human instinct for 
getting and holding. Acquisitiveness is as necessary a part 
of our natural endowment as any other instinct. It is against 
the preversion of this instinct that I raise my voice. 

Many in our generation, it seems, have come to believe that 
"money answereth all things," that the great purpose of life 
is to acquire and keep; and while this sentiment is not uni- 
versal, it is, nevertheless, true that Phocion, who might have 
been rich, though he preferred to remain poor, is not one of 
the patron saints of any American community. 

Do not infer, however, that I underestimate the value of 
money. Money is power. It speaks every language and dialect, 
understands the customs and manners of all peoples, sails every 
sea, climbs the highest mountain, and traverses the widest plain. 
Yes, money is power. It enabled Columbus to discover Amer- 
ica, it has checkered every continent with railways, filled all 
seas with the Argosies of commerce, brought to light the terra 
incognita of other days, discovered the North Pole, built the 
Panama Canal, equipped hospitals and sanitariums, erected 
churches for prayer, endowed colleges for education, and sent 
missionaries throughout the world. 

On the other hand, money is today prosecuting the most san- 
guinary war known to men. It is plowing the fields of Europe 
with cannon shot, and obscuring the sun and the moon with the 
smoke of battle. It is destroying cities and villages, homes and 
farms. It is pouring out the red blood of the best French and 
German and Austrian and English and Eussian and Italian 
youth. It is rendering homes desolate, wives widows, and 
children orphans. It is letting loose every demon of destruc- 
tion and damnation, and trampling under foot every good 
thing that hundreds of years of civilization have developed. 
Yes, money is power, as great a power for evil as for good. 

Allow me now to affirm emphatically that money is not the 
end, that "a man's life consisteth in the abundance of the 



R. H. CROSSFIELD 303 

things which he possesseth." Read again, if you will, the 
story of the rich fool, and then turn your eyes this way and 
that, and see him, your contemporary, the man whose gold is 
his god. As he says, "And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou 
hast much goods laid up for many years ; take thine ease, eat, 
drink, and be merry." You may hear the God of heaven an- 
swer, "Thou foolish one, this night is thy soul required of thee, 
and the things which thou hast prepared, whose shall they be ? ' ' 

Yes, verily money takes wings and flies away. 

Nor is the true measure of man found in the attainment of 
selfish ambition. 

Once more I beg that you do not misunderstand me. Ambi- 
tion is both good and necessary. It means the planning for, and 
reaching out after that which is beyond. It signifies the ideal 
toward which we strive, and which constitutes so valuable an 
inspiration. It says, 

"Anywhere but where we are, 
Nothing could be worse than this; 
The best is good enough for us." 

It points out that 

' ' Too low they build who build beneath the stars. ' ' 

Selfish ambition is another matter, is manifestly unworthy, 
and must ever fail. Shakespeare makes one of his characters 
say, 

' ' By that sin fell the angels ; how can man then, 
In the image of his Maker, hope to win by it 1 f ' 

Croesus undertook to carry out a program of personal ambi- 
tion with disastrous results. He said, ' ' I will become great and 
famous by amassing the largest fortune the world has ever 
known." He built Sardis, his capital, in marble, like the 
Athens of Pericles or Augustan Rome; he swelled the coffers of 
his treasury until they were bursting with wealth; he provided 
for the gratification of every desire, although to do these things 
he was compelled to pillage the surrounding nations, and to 
cause poverty and want to knock at many a door. He enslaved 



304 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

his fellows, made in the image of God, and sent them out as 
servitors of his ambitions. 

But Nemesis never fails. Solon, who visited Croesus, and 
who was asked by this regal friend, ' ' Who is the happiest man 
you have met?" replied, ''Count no man fortunate or happy 
until the end has come."" That was the answer of wisdom. 
Sardis, the capital of Lydia, was soon sacked by Cyrus of Persia 
who invaded the realm. Croesus was degraded, placed on a 
funeral pyre, and his ambition brought to an ignominious end. 

Julius Caesar furnished the world another startling example 
of selfish ambition. Historians say that his supreme desire was 
to be king. Having done so much to unify and enlighten the 
world of his day, he essayed to become the ruler of the world. 
Shakespeare makes Brutus say in his famous oration, 

"As Caesar loved me, I weep for him; as lie was fortunate I rejoice 
at it; as he was valiant, I honor him; but as he was ambitious, I slew 
him. There is tears, for his love; joy, for his fortune; honor, for his valor, 
and death, for his ambition. ' ' 

In more recent times, Napoleon Bonaparte furnishes the 
most conspicuous example of inordinate, selfish ambition. Like 
Alexander, he wanted to rule the world. To do so, he was 
willing to wade through blood to a throne. He was ready to 
break the eggs to make the omelet. But his success, which 
arose so gloriously at Austerlitz, and which crowned him em- 
peror in the palace of Tuilleries, soon began to decline, and his 
overthrow was the significant climacteric of Waterloo. 

Life cannot be properly measured by any of these norms. 
They are the dross which corrupts, and which is burned. None 
of them abide. Riches take wings and fly away. "The path 
of glory leads but to the grave." The monarch is robbed of 
his sceptre, his ermine, his crown. After the great change 
comes, Cleopatra has no more charms than the veriest hag. 
The Venus of beauty finally loses her lure. In the silent cham- 
ber of death, all are brought to one level. Lazarus and Dives 
sleep side by side in the grave. Julius Caesar, occupying six 
feet of earth, is no more potent than a dead slave. 



R. H. CEOSSFIELD 305 

If this be true, and who will doubt it? then, "Why should 
the spirit of mortal be proud ? ' ' 

What, then, abides with us forever, which we may properly 
call our own? What can we carry with us into the beyond? 
What is worth while? I hear a voice saying, "If riches and 
glory and honor and beauty and power are stripped from us by 
the hand of misfortune, there yet remaineth the holy, Heavenly 
Three, Faith, Hope and Love." These three abide, and from 
them the soul derives its nourishment and joy. 

I announce, then, the conclusion that the measure of man is 
found in the character he ouilds. 

The first element of that character is Faith. 

"According to thy faith so is thy life." Faith is a magic 
word, a term to conjure with. It has in it the spirit of con- 
quest. It possesseth the assurance of any army with banners. 
Faith climbs the steepest mountain, descends into the most 
precipitous chasm. Faith feeds and clothes the wretched Laz- 
arus, strikes the chains from the hands and feet of the Apostle, 
and sets the prisoner free. You cannot destroy faith. It abides 
forever. If you will examine the 11th chapter of Hebrews, 
you will find that in all the trials to which those holy martyrs 
were subjected — the rack, the gibbet, the fire, the lions and the 
like — they never lost their faith. Yes, faith is the victory, for 
it never dies. You cannot crucify it upon a tree, behead it 
upon the block, drown it in the sea. 

Another element of character is Hope. 

* ' Why art thou cast down, my soul ? and why art thou dis- 
quieted within me ? Hope thou in God. ' ' Surely this has been 
the solace and consolation of men under all circumstances and 
during all trials. 

I hear the voice of singing. It is midnight's holy hour. 
Paul and Silas are leading the refrain. How can they sing in 
such a filthy Roman dungeon, their wounds all gaping, and 
their bodies weakened by loss of blood, and their companions 
in durance jeering and taunting them? The answer is, They 
have hope in God. 

Christian in the Castle of Giant Despair is not dejected nor 



306 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

unliappy. Why this? He discovers a key in his bosom, the 
key of Hope. That makes him glad. 

Madam Guyon, in Castle Vincennes, sings a song in her 
lonely confinement. That song is the inspiration of Hope. 
Thos. Brown was voicing his hope when he said, "In expecta- 
tion of a better, I can embrace this life." 

Hope says, "I shall see my pilot face to face, when I have 
crossed the bar;" "There is rest for the weary, if rest they 
will seek;" "I am going home tomorrow." 

The last element of character that constitutes the worth- 
while life is Love. 

Fichte wrote, "We only live when we love." What do we 
mean by the familiar term love? It is the manifestation of 
such a spirit as the Master revealed to the world — the giving 
of a cup of cold water, the visiting of the sick and the impris- 
oned, the feeding of the hungry, the clothing of the naked, the 
relieving of distress, — in a word, absolute self -for getting serv- 
ice. It means the uplifting of all classes and conditions. It 
means the helping of the man across the street or across the 
world. It means the ennobling of life everywhere. 

This is my message. Will you make this standard the meas- 
ure of your life ? Will you consecrate your abilities to such a 
task? Nothing less than this ideal is worthy. 

"We are building every day, in a good or evil way, 
And the building as it grows, will our inmost self enclose. 
Build it well, whate'er you do, 
Build it strong and straight and true, 
Build it clean and high and good, 
Build it for the eye of God." 



BURRIS A. JENKINS 

T> URRIS A. JENKINS was born in Kansas City, Mo., October 2, 1869. 
•*-* Was educated in the public schools of Kansas City, and graduated 
from Bethany College, W. Va., with a degree of A.B., 1891; spent two 
years in Yale Seminary, and two in the Harvard Divinity School, tak- 
ing from the latter the degrees of B.D. 1895 and A.M. 1896. He was 
pastor of the Third Christian church, Indianapolis, Ind., from '96 to '98; 
president! of the University of Indianapolis 1898 to 1900- He was pastor 
of the Eichmond Avenue Christian church of Buffalo, N. Y., 1900 to 1901; 
president of the Kentucky University 1901 to 1906; and pastor of the 
Linwood Boulevard Christian church, Kansas City, from 1907 to the 
present time. 

In all these positions Dr. Jenkins has shown marked ability; but his 
greatest success has been at the church he now serves. The completion 
of the splendid edifice where the church meets was itself a great achieve- 
ment, but a far greater work is going on all the time under the leader- 
ship of Dr. Jenkins, viz., the filling of this house with worshipers and chil- 
dren studying the Scriptures in the great Bible school. The church mem- 
bership has now reached about 1,500, while the Bible school numbers 
have reached nearly 1,000. 

Dr. Jenkins' health has recently been somewhat precarious, but he 
seems to be growing stronger. He is a hard student, and his sermons 
are generally fresh and able. If we judge the ministry of Dr. Jenkins 
by its fruit, his great church on Linwood Ave. makes favorable answer. 
Can a man be a fine preacher and at the same time not be much of a theo- 
logian? It is highly probable that the most successful and popular 
preachers among the Disciples are not theologians at all. Dr. Jenkins 
would probably be classed with the preachers who gave little attention to 
a cut and dried theology. He does his own thinking regardless of what 
others may think about him. But the measure of his power is his suc- 
cess in the ministry. 

Dr. Jenkins' martial spirit impels him to leave his great church for 
a time and seek service beyond the seas. He went to Europe last year, 
under the auspices of the Y. M. C. A., for work among the soldiers, re- 
turning in time to attend the General Convention at Kansas City in 
October. Outside of the convention program he delivered a series of 
remarkable lectures on his experiences in Y. M. C. A. work among the 
soldiers in France. He has now resumed his work at his church in 
Kansas City. 

307 



VIOLENCE TO THE KINGDOM OF GOD 

By Burris A. Jenkins 

Text. — And from the days of John the Baptist until now the 
kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and men of violence 
take it by force. — Matthew 11 :12. 

THOSE words, "king" and "kingdom," have ever been 
magic words among men. From the time when Israel 
rightly demanded a king and Sanl defended his title with his 
blood, from the time when he consulted the witch of Endor in 
the night; and from the time when in our own grandfather- 
land Macbeth sought the three witches and found for himself 
"double, double, toil and trouble;" from that time to the days 
when Julius Caesar fell dead at the foot of Pompey's statue; 
to the days when Eichard Coeur de Lion strove against that 
knightly Saracen Sultan Saladin, to the time when the third 
Eichard slew the little princes in the tower, and to this present 
moment when kings great and small are striving with each 
other for kingdoms big and little, these two words have been 
magic words with which to conjure — words that have stirred 
men's souls. And Jesus, designedly I think, selected the words 
to convey the idea of his increasing influence amongst man- 
kind. "The kingdom of heaven" was not an aimless choice 
as a phrase by which to represent his dominion. 

The cry, ' ' The kingdom of heaven is at hand ! " in the wilder- 
ness of Jordan was just as startling to the people of Israel as 
the cry "The Eevolution is here!" was to Paris in '93. And 
the Hebrews were just as ready to pull up paving stones and 
build barricades and deal death in behalf of their conception 
of the kingdom of God as were the Parisians in behalf of Lib- 
erty, Fraternity and Equality in the days of the Commune. 
For Israel stood with eyes to the East, on tiptoe, expectant, 
waiting for the moment to come when the king should return 

309 



310 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

who should restore to Israel the pristine glory of David and of 
Solomon; and they were perfectly sure that that day would 
dawn, nay, that that day was near at hand, when the voice of 
John the Baptist was lifted in the wilderness. And I think 
Jesus uttered that phrase, "From the days of John the Baptist 
until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence and men 
of violence take it by force ' ' with a deep tone of sadness and of 
disappointment. He knew perfectly well the conception of the 
kingdom that had been in Israel's heart. He knew that it was 
a purely material conception; that their highest idea was to 
restore again the toppled and crumbled throne of David and 
of Solomon. He knew that in that day men were banded to- 
gether in Galilee, in Judea and even in Samaria, with arms 
stored and munitions prepared, with standards and slogans 
selected and captains chosen against that great day when they 
should go forth again to their place in the sun. 

The disappointment in the Master's heart lay in the fact that 
even John's influence, when he came preaching in the wilder- 
ness of Judea the baptism of repentance for the remission of 
sins had not been able to give to the people a more spiritual 
conception of the kingdom of God. Nay, further than that, 
with all his instruction, his own disciples had not yet caught a 
conception of what he meant by the phrases, "the kingdom of 
God" and "the kingdom of heaven." As he passed through 
Samaria footsore and weary on a certain day and would have 
entered into one of the villages of Samaria the grandees of that 
people met him at the gate and thrust him out, and they said: 
"This heretic, this renegade Jew, shall not enter here." Then 
it was that the Sons of Thunder, James and John, turned to 
him and said, "Master, wilt thou that we call down fire from 
on high and burn up these people ? ' ' And Jesus said, ' ' Ye know 
not what spirit ye are of." Now the days had gone and the 
weeks and months, and still the inner circle of his twelve had 
not caught his conception, his spiritual vision of the kingdom 
of God. So it is with infinite pathos that he speaks these 
words, ' ' From the days of John the Baptist, ' ' when the cry of 
"The kingdom of heaven !" was first lifted, to this present hour, 



BURRIS A. JENKINS 311 

"the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence and men of violence 
take it by force.' ' 

Two thousand years have passed since these words were 
spoken, and I think they are as true today as they were when 
first uttered. Two millenniums! And still the kingdom of 
heaven suffered violence. It has through all the centuries. 
Read the records of the church councils with their curses and 
their clubs and their knives. Read the records of the inquisi- 
tions with their gridirons and their torture chambers, unspeak- 
able in their horrors. Read the records of the religious wars 
of Charles V and Philip of France, and William of Orange 
fighting for his liberty to think and believe, of Christian and 
Saracen bathing in blood the sands of Syria in the name of the 
Holy Sepulchre. Read the records of modern councils where 
churches have striven for material influence and power, plotted 
and counterplotted for political position and predominance, 
tried their best men, ostracized them, bound them hand and 
foot, and the statement of the Master applies as well today as 
it did two thousand years ago. The kingdom of heaven from 
the days of John the Baptist until now suffereth violence and 
men of violence take it by force ! 

There are two or three things which may be said concerning 
violent conceptions of the kingdom of God — conceptions out of 
harmony with our Master's high spiritual notion. These con- 
ceptions are always negative in character; they are always 
material; they lead inevitably to despair. 

They are negative — as negative as the spirit of the Samari- 
tans who said, "Thou shalt not enter here;" as negative as 
the spirit of the officers who met the Master on the steps of 
the temple and thrust him out and said, "By what authority 
doest thou these things?" In the same fashion men are stand- 
ing on the steps of the visible kingdom of Cod today and are 
saying to other men who would enter into the kingdom, "You 
shall not enter here." Wherever one stands before the door 
of the church of Jesus Christ with analytical creed tests he is 
doing violence to the kingdom of God. Where he offers any 
written or unwritten "I believes" and "Thou shalt believes" 



312 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

for the subscription and the acquiescence of any humble seeker 
after God he is doing violence to the kingdom of the Master. 
He is negative in his attitude, thrusting men out instead of 
bringing men in. And the only people against whom our 
Master hurled withering denunciation were people of that 
stamp, when he said, "Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, 
for ye will neither enter into the kingdom of heaven, nor will 
ye permit those that are entering in to enter in." 

God forbid, my friends, that at any time, before the judg- 
ment seat of God any grandees of the church of Christ of the 
Twentieth Century should hear that same denunciation, "Ye 
would neither enter in, nor would ye permit those that are 
entering to enter in. ,, 

You say that that spirit is not alive in the church? Oh! 
but it is, my friends. I was walking one night under the stars 
at Harvard University with a fellow student who was in the 
department of law. I asked him why he was not a Christian, 
and he said, "I have always had some doubts concerning the 
immortality of the soul." I did not argue with him concern- 
ing the immortality of the soul. I simply said to him, "The 
essential thing is belief that Jesus is the Christ the Son of 
God. You have that belief?" "Yes," he replied. "Then," 
said I, "that is enough." I did not even tell him that belief 
in the immortality of the soul was an inevitable corollary of 
belief in the divine Son of God. I knew his legal mind would 
sooner or later lead him to that conclusion. It was enough 
that he should believe that Jesus was the Christ the Son of 
the living God. 

Well, we separated. Years passed. He went to his home in 
the South, to a large practice of law, and to a prominent posi- 
tion amongst the citizenry of his native state. We exchanged 
letters a few times in the passing years. Finally I wrote him, 
"Have you ever become a Christian?" I shall never forget his 
reply. He wrote back saying: I sought admission to my an- 
cestral church, and the ecclesiastic of that church asked me, 
"Do you believe in God Almighty, the maker of heaven and 
earth?" "Yes." "Do you believe in Jesus Christ as the 



BURRIS A. JENKINS 313 

Son of God and your Savior V "Yes." "Do you believe 
in the Holy Spirit, God present in the world, comforting saints 
and convicting sinners?" "Yes." "Do you believe in this 
and that and the other?" "Yes." "Do you believe in the im- 
mortality of the soul?" And I said, "I don't know." 
"Then," said the ecclesiastic of that ancient church, "you 
cannot enter here." 

Oh, my friends, I would not take that responsibility upon 
my shoulders for all the gold of India ! 

I wonder, if any man comes here tonight to make the good 
confession of his faith, whether I shall dare to ask him any 
other question than "Do you believe that Jesus is the Christ 
the Son of God?" 

Now, don't let anybody go from the house and say, the 
preacher cast doubt upon the immortality of the soul, or that 
he spoke of it slightingly, as unimportant. Why, it is the 
basis of all religious thought. I believe it with all the firm- 
ness of my mind, my heart and soul, else I would not be here 
preaching tonight. But I do insist that any attitude towards 
the untried and unknown problems of man's intellectual life 
has no place in the test of entrance into the kingdom of God 
on earth. No. Further than that, it cannot prevent any man 
from entering who desires to enter. And all the flaming 
swords of creed tests that are put in front of the church of 
Jesus Christ in all the earth cannot prevent one sincere soul 
from coming into the real kingdom, which is not visible and is 
not seen. 

The whole spirit of legislation wherever encountered in the 
church of Jesus Christ is contrary to the spirit of the king- 
dom of our Master and does violence to the kingdom. When- 
ever men formulate disciplines and constitutions and demand 
from other men signatures to them and adherence to them, 
whenever the church sets forth a list of "Thou shalts" and 
"Thou shalt nots" with regard to one's conduct and one's 
attitude towards life, in that very moment the church is doing 
violence to the spirit of the Master, who gave no such command. 

Now, then, don't let anybody say that the preacher said it 



314 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

does not make any difference what Christian people do. It 
makes the greatest difference in the world, for it gives tone 
to the kingdom; and the influence of the kingdom upon men 
who are outside of it depends upon the purity of conduct, the 
uprightness and the integrity of the known members of the 
kingdom; for the Master said, "Ye are the light of the 
world" and "A city set upon a hill cannot be hid;" "By their 
fruits ye shall know them," and so on. 

But the kingdom itself has no right of legislation, and 
wherever legalism enters into it and the dominance of ecclesi- 
astics and conferences and combinations of men, in that very 
moment it is doing violence to the kingdom of God. When 
any convention, when any board of officers or elders, when 
any newspaper, or when any self-constituted authority in the 
kingdom of God seeks to dominate either the intellectual life 
or the conduct of any member of the kingdom, be he the high- 
est ecclesiastic or the lowliest worshiper, he is doing violence 
to the kingdom of God. 

Now, in the second place, these conceptions of the kingdom 
are always material in their character. They see the king- 
dom, or they think they see it, and insist that its manifestation 
is visible and can be marked and known. 

Mark Twain, in one of his books, "Life on the Mississippi," 
tells how an old colored uncle saw for the first time a Missis- 
sippi river steamboat coming up the stream. As he peered out 
of the canebrake of the far South and saw this strange, 
weird, impressive monster nosing its way slowly up the river 
and belching forth smoke and sparks and uttering a tremen- 
dous and strange noise, the old negro turned and ran as fast 
as he could into the thickness of the cane and, falling upon his 
knees, his hands clasped in prayer, cried out, "Oh, Lord, have 
mercy upon my soul 'case the kingdom am a-comin'." He 
thought he saw the Lord God Almighty coming up that river 
in visible form. 

There are many of us — you and me — that are just as simple- 
minded as that old negro of the canebrake, for whenever we 
see a great disturbance and hear the big noise and see smoke 



BURRIS A. JENKINS 315 

and sparks flying, we say "The kingdom is coming. Great 
things are being done for the kingdom of God, because we can 
see them being done." This is violence to the kingdom of 
heaven. Jesus said, "You cannot say Lo, here, and Lo there, 
for the kingdom of God cometh not with observation." 

Now, there are three kinds of churches in the cities today, 
which I think do violence to the kingdom of God in their 
materialistic and their intellectual attitude. We may call 
these churches the "prosperity" church, the "pyrotechnical" 
church and the "philosophical" church. The "prosperity" 
church is beautiful with its groined arches and its stained- 
glass windows, with the roll of its great organ and the sweet- 
ness of its choir's message, its aisles carpeted so heavily that 
no sound of footfall ever echoes there. Its seats are so cush- 
ioned that they are comfortable to the utmost. Its people are 
dressed and gowned to the very hour, and into it cometh 
nothing that offendeth or that maketh a noise. 

The "pyrotechnical" church is plastered all over its front 
with red and blue and green signs. It is exploited far and 
wide. It does everything to make a noise. It is sensational. 
It believes in a certain type of evangelism and interprets the 
words of Jesus, Go out and compel men to come in, with the 
crowd-psychology and hypnotism. 

The "philosophical" church is the one in which the teach- 
ers of the high school, most of them, are present, and the 
members of the press and of the library association — the intel- 
lectual elite of the community. They are the ones who know 
a great deal, and they know how to test religion by a thor- 
ough-going intellectual test. 

If a minister goes to preach in the "prosperity" church let 
him take his best coat; if he goes to preach in the "pyrotech- 
nical" church let him take his best Fourth-of-July oration; if 
he goes to preach in the "philosophical" church let him take 
his doctor's thesis, if he has one. If a humble worshiper 
goes to the "prosperity" church he will find there sweet 
odors that are not incense unto God; if he goes to the "pyro- 
technical" church he will find the atmosphere heavy with 



316 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

false emotion — false laughter and false tears; if he goes to 
the "philosophical" church he will see his breath in the 
frosty air. 

There were some people converted by the assistant pastor 
of a certain great "prosperity" church in a certain Eastern 
city where I was a student at the time. This young assistant, 
in all his enthusiasm had gone down into the slums, into the 
alleys, into the rookeries, and had converted something like 
a hundred people, and they wanted to join the church. Well, 
the board of officers of the "prosperity" church took it up and 
they decided, "We do not want these people and this kind of 
people in our church at all," and they voted that they would 
not let them in. Now, that is a fact, because I was there and 
knew about it. I knew the young assistant pastor, for he was 
a fellow-student. The pastor of that church, a man whose 
name you would know if I should mention it here, so widely 
is he known and read after and loved, was tempted to resign 
because of this action of the board; but finally decided, and, I 
think, wisely, that that congregation of people needed his 
ministrations worse than any congregation in the United 
States, and so he stayed with them. 

The "pyrotechnical" church is cursed always by the sensa- 
tional character of its message. It is well to bring the mes- 
sage home to the minds and hearts and comprehensions of 
men by every legitimate means, but it is not well to do or say 
anything that is irreverent in connection with the message of 
the kingdom of heaven for it is doing violence to the spirit 
of it. 

Last of all, these violent conceptions of the kingdom lead 
inevitably to despair. John himself, the Baptist, was a de- 
spairer, else he never would have sent out of the prison and 
asked Jesus, "Art thou he that should come, or look we for 
another?" The Pharisees themselves, who expected the ma- 
terial kingdom and a prince on earth with all the regalia and 
all the shimmer and all the glory of an earthly prince, were 
despairers. They knew their candlestick was fast being moved 
out of its place and that their house was fast being left unto 



BURRIS A. JENKINS 317 

them desolate. And so will every one be who takes a material 
and negative and violent conception of the kingdom. He must 
despair. Why, the church cannot for a moment, in material 
successes, compare with the great organized efforts of men. The 
church in the world today cannot compare in the beauty of 
its organization, or the symmetry or the power of it, with the 
army of any one of the contending nations on their foreign 
battlefields at this hour. The church cannot compare in 
strength of treasuries or in the glory and majesty of its build- 
ings with the banks and the trust companies of our country 
alone. It cannot compare in wealth and position and visible 
evidences of power with the insurance societies and the benevo- 
lent organizations amongst men at this present moment. And 
so whenever we take the violent view of the kingdom we begin 
to compare it by what we see of it and with what we can see 
of the great institutions and interests about us ; and from that 
moment we are treading in the path that leads to inevitable 
despair. For it never will compare in visible power with the 
material works and achievements and organizations of men. 

If I thought that the kingdom were coterminal with any 
church, my own little section of the great Church of Christ 
in the world, or the whole of the Church of Christ in the 
world; if I thought those boundaries could be drawn and de- 
fined, if I believed that its power and success and influence 
could be measured by its numbers and its visible achievement, 
I would be forced to do one of two things; either to quit 
preaching and take to the sword and try to persuade my fellow 
ministers to do the same and to band ourselves together into an 
army and go out, like Mohammed to conquer the world for Jesus 
Christ by force and by violence; or else, sitting down upon the 
ash-heap of my despair, with no potsherd of comfort in my 
extremity, I would be tempted, like Job, to curse God and die. 

But, thank God! the kingdom of God is not negative, and 
it is not material, and it does not lead to despair, but it leads 
to undying hope. The kingdom that Jesus came to set up on 
earth was positive. He gave no "Thou shalt nots" and he 
gave only one "Thou shalt" — Love! It was spiritual. It 



318 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

does not appeal to material evidences and material forces. It 
does not expect material results and material power. 
It takes its residence within where it cannot be seen 
and denned except as it shines out in reflection over the 
face and through the life, and it leads to hope — hope that is 
undying. For so surely as that Jesus our Master lives at 
this hour and is the most dominant influence in the world of 
men, so surely of his kingdom there shall be no end. 

A man was once on trial for his life. It was in the gray 
dawn of the Syrian day before the sun had risen in the east ; 
and he stood with his accusers before the representative of the 
greatest empire on earth; and the bullet-healed Pilate said 
to him, "A king!" half in pity and half in derision. He 
looked at this poor, bedraggled, wan and ashen-hued prisoner 
at the bar. "A king! They say that thou callest thyself a 
king." And the Master answered, "Yea, thou sayest it. I 
am a king. For this cause came I into the world, to bear wit- 
ness to the truth. But my kingdom is not of this world, else 
would my servants fight. I am a king." And he was, every 
inch a king. He is the king of this poor distracted, warring, 
sinning world at this hour. And, thank God! without battles 
and without strife his kingdom is spreading, spreading, grow- 
ing, growing every hour, until the time shall soon come when 
the knowledge of him shall cover the earth as the waters cover 
the sea. 



CHARLES S. MEDBURY 

TTpEW preachers among the Disciples of Christ have a wider field of use- 
■1 fulness than has Chas. S. Medbury. It is also time that he meets 
the obligations of this position with marked ability and faithfulness. 

He was the son of Sheldon and Melinda (Sanderson) Medbury. Born 
at Warren, Ohio, November 19, 1865. Obeyed the gospel under the min- 
istry of Dr. I. A.) Thayer at Warren when a lad of thirteen. Education 
in the public schools of Warren and Cleveland, Ohio, and Eureka Col- 
lege. In early young manhood several years business life in Cleveland, 
O., Erie, Pa., and Chicago. Married Dec. 30, 1890, to Anna Laura Pick- 
rell, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. James H. Pickrell, lovingly known to 
Illinois Discipleship. Earliest preaching done at Nunda and Carlock, 
111. Following college days accepted first regular pastorate at El Paso, 
111., January 1, 1898. Eemained in El Paso four years. The 1st of Janu- 
ary, 1897, opened a seven years' pastorate at Angola, Ind. January 1st, 
1904, came to Des Moines, Iowa, to the pastorate of the University Church. 
In 1898 served as Chaplain of the 157th regiment, Indiana Volunteer 
Infantry, in the Spanish-American War. In 1909 president of the Ameri- 
can Christian Missionary Society at the Centennial Convention. In addi- 
tion to duties of present pastorate has the privileges and obligations of 
the Chaplaincy of Drake University, which institution granted him the 
degree Doctor of Divinity in 1909. Lectures each summer in the Chau- 
tauqua field. Is a member of the Christian Unity Commission of the 
Disciples of Christ and a member of the Board of Directors of the 
Christian Board of Publication. Is the author of a series of Bible study 
textbooks covering in three volumes a course of studies "From Eden to 
Bethlehem." 

Dr. Medbury 's preaching has heart-power as well as intellect. This 
makes him eminently fit for pastoral work. His preaching is strongly 
supplemented by close and sympathetic personal touch with his eongre- 
tion. His people know him and to know him is to love him. He is 
the soul of courtesy and kindness, and it is human nature to respond 
quickly to these qualities. 

But Dr. Medbury holds also an important and influential place in the 
general field of usefulness. His record indicates he is extensively iden- 
tified with all the important outstanding work of the Disciples. He is not 
a meteor, flashing a brilliant flame, and then dying out with equal 
rapidity, but he is a steady and permanent light, shining brighter and 
brighter as he grows in grace and in the knowledge of the truth. Take 
him all in all Dr. Medbury is one of our greatest pastors and preachers. 

319 




Cordially yours, 




CHRISTIAN STEWARDSHIP 

By C. S. Medbury 

Texts.— (2 Cor. 8:1-9; 2 Cor. 9:6-15; Luke 16:1-13; Matt. 
25:14-30.) 

THE parables of our Lord give to us spiritual truths in the 
setting of familiar, every day experiences. Our heavenly 
Father's forbearance and love are taught in the parable of 
the prodigal son. The importance of a right attitude toward 
the truth is emphasized in the parable of the sower. God's 
care of the individual finds wonderful expression in the par- 
able of the good shepherd. The value of the kingdom is re- 
vealed clearly in the parables of the hid treasure and the pearl 
of great price. In just the same way our relationship to God 
through our possessions is made known, from heaven's view- 
point, in the parables of the steward and the talents. 

A recognition of the force of other -parables binds us to 
accept the Savior's plain teachings as to our stewardship. It 
will not do to praise the Master's revelation of a Father's 
love and then set at naught his teaching as to our practical 
relationships to that same Father in the consecration of our 
means to the doing of his work. And yet we are pitifully 
slow to grasp the fact that it is entirely inconsistent to accept 
all that Jesus says about love's gifts to us and then to disre- 
gard his teachings as to the call for our gifts of love to 
others. Strikingly has some one said, that the next great 
struggle within the church will be ''the battle of steward- 
ship." "We may be thankful that the lines for that battle are 
already drawn and the issue is not in doubt. 

The Fundamental Misconception 

There is a fundamental misconception in the view of multi- 
tudes of the Disciples of our Lord as to their relationship to 



322 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

their possessions. We constantly boast of our ownership, 
when this ground of boasting is really denied us altogether. 
Let the Scriptures be heard, "Behold unto Jehovah thy God 
belongeth heaven and the heaven of heavens, the earth, with 
all that is therein." (Dent. 10:14.) "The silver is mine and 
the gold is mine, saith Jehovah of hosts." (Haggai 2:8.) 
"For every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle upon a 
thousand hills." (Ps. 50:10.) And even beyond these strong 
words it is strikingly significant to hear Paul say "ye are not 
your own; for ye were bought with a price." (1 Cor. 6:19, 
20.) How little warrant do these ringing words of Holy Writ 
leave us for our pitiful pride of possessions! 

The real problem is not that we give more or upon a different 
plan, but that we give with a radically different conception of 
our relations to our possessions. We are not owners but 
stewards. What we have we hold in trust. The recognition 
of this would transform religious conditions. A new day will 
dawn when a sense of actual accountability to God for all our 
resources comes to possess the Discipleship of Jesus. 

Obligations of Stewaedship 

The obligation of a steward is so to use trust funds as to 
advance the owner's interests — to increase his holdings. A 
steward is "not a slave but a trusted agent, a representative, 
a trustee," This is our amazing relationship to God. In the 
affairs of men the matter is clearly understood. The steward 
or trustee is constantly careful of "the goods" he handles. A 
day of accounting is always before him. He wants the praise 
of the owner for his business wisdom and his integrity in 
handling the property entrusted to his care. He shrinks 
from the possibility of a charge of "wasting his goods." It 
is clearly before him that the owner has the perfect right 
to ask an accounting and the privilege of telling him that he 
"canst be no longer steward" if there is anything in his con- 
duct that is unsatisfactory. 

By analogy carry these things over into the realm of our 
relationship to God. What of the year that is past? Every- 



CHARLES S. MEDBURY 323 

one of us has been a steward of the treasure of God. We have 
had health and strength and friends and time and money. 
Some of us, by kindly providences, have been granted special 
gifts. We have had the power of public speech. We have 
had the ability to play or sing. We have had the ability to 
throw scenes of beauty upon the canvas or to chisel forms of 
grace from marble. We have been permitted attainments far 
beyond the rank and file in educational lines. We have been 
entrusted, beyond our fellows, with a knowledge of the world 
and its life which is of incalculable value. Our incomes in 
some instances have been great. The return from invest- 
ments has been fortunate. What has it all meant to our God 
from whom the health has come and who has given us the time 
and means we have enjoyed? By our use of treasure with 
which he has intrusted us, have the interests of God been ad- 
vanced in the world, have his spiritual holdings increased? 
If not, we may well fear the accounting, as we shall surely face 
the just charge of "wasting his goods." 

And it must be remembered that we are dealing with one 
whom we cannot deceive. He knows us now individually as 
clearly as the rich man in the parable knew the wasteful 
steward of old. As in the olden days "the hire of the laborers" 
which was "kept back by fraud" (James 5:1-5) cried out and 
reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth, so every evasion and 
subterfuge is known today and all mistreatment of others 
revealed. And so, too, is our selfishness and our sinful self- 
indulgence a matter of definite knowledge. We may explain 
situations so that men may think us generous even when we 
are hiding the bounty of God. But we cannot deceive the 
Lord himself. 

The Christian Conception 

The thought of the child of God should be that every dollar, 
in its use, should tell upon the advancement of the kingdom 
of God in the earth. This by no means involves the giving 
away of all to what we know, technically, as religious work. 
It does involve, however, holding all that we have, literally, 



324 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

subject to heaven's mission in the earth, the saving and en- 
nobling of the race. This was the thought of Livingstone 
when he exclaimed so splendidly "I will place no value on 
anything I have or may possess except in its relation to the 
kingdom of Christ." 

At this point there is a possibility of fanaticism on the 
one hand and of self-deception on the other. Between the 
two is the line of responsible Christian stewardship to which 
we are called. And in this problem our homes, our dress, the 
food upon our tables, our books, our pictures, our music, our 
entertainment, our travel and even the education of our 
children are all involved. Asceticism is not at all in mind 
on the one hand but careless indulgences are certainly re- 
proved on the other. The line of safety is in this. We are to 
avail ourselves of anything and all things which tell upon life 
for enrichment for service. But there is one unfailing test. 
There is one way we can determine as to the undertone of 
life. We must not only long to give more to the work but 
we must give more. If our offerings do not increase in pro- 
portion to our blessings, we are going backward. Even the 
cry of life enrichment deceives many. It is often the outer 
adornment instead of character beautifying and glorifying 
that is resulting from our use of funds entrusted to our hands. 

If a man is receiving a larger salary this year than last, 
if his business is more prosperous, if he has a more beautiful 
home, or improved educational or health conditions, he is 
under absolutely commanding obligations to God to make a 
larger return to the work this year than he did last year. Not 
to do so is plainly robbing God. The increase of means or 
the increase of capability for service in any line, simply means 
that more of heaven's capital has been committed to our hands 
and from it the Lord has the right to look for returns. Nor 
will it do to take the increase from this larger capital and 
consume it upon ourselves as we scale up the expenses of our 
living. A man can keep himself ''poor" all the time by buy- 
ing more land or building more beautiful homes or making 
more splendid his business plant or by a thousand personal 



CHARLES S. MEDBURY 325 

indulgences. Meanwhile God is calling for a return from his 
stewardship and a man who ''wastes" God's treasure upon 
himself through a series of years is facing a terrific awaken- 
ing. No steward or trustee in the business world would 
dream for a moment that he was free to make the same return 
to a man for whom he was handling a hundred thousand dol- 
lars as he could make when handling five thousand dollars. 
He would recognize at once and all the time that he was of 
course responsible for a return in keeping with the increased 
amount entrusted to his hands. Yet all over the world there 
are men and women today, whose net incomes are thousands 
of dollars where in years gone they were hundreds but whose 
gifts to the cause have hardly increased at all. But the bet- 
ter day is dawning. A new sense of responsibility is coming 
to multitudes. 

The Joy of Faithful Stewardship 

What is finer than the conscious integrity of a man who 
has handled faithfully the estate of another? So with the 
man who has dealt fairly with his Lord in the realm of his 
possessions. He is ready to face the Master any day. He is 
sharing with the Lord the keen delights of spiritual pros- 
perity. Such an one grows amazingly, for giving is a means 
of growth. "It nourishes the life of God in the soul." Who 
among us enjoys most today? Who lives most? That man 
who, in proportion to his means, gives most. 

Giving opens the pathway of closest fellowship with God. 
Heaven's gifts are always bountiful. "Every good and every 
perfect gift is from above." (James 1:17). "God so loved 
the world that he gave his son." (John 3:16). There are no 
narrow limits here. There is no close figuring. It is an 
abundant and an abounding giving to us. And with the Mas- 
ter it was the same. There was no thought of reservation. 
"The son of man came not to be ministered unto but to min- 
ister, and to give his life a ransom for many." (Matt. 20:28). 
"For your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty 
might become rich." (2 Cor. 8:9.) How such gifts shame 



326 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

what we call giving! Are you looking for Jesus? You will 
find him in the pathway of self-denial. 

And do you fear to give even in the way of an honest 
steward's return to the Lord? Does generosity suggest im- 
poverishment? You have forgotten what he said whose 
" goods" you are handling. "Honor Jehovah with thy sub- 
stance, and with the first fruits of all thine increase. So shall 
thy barns be filled with plenty and thy vats shall overflow 
with new wine." (Prov. 3:9,10.) This does not suggest the 
poorhouse for those who deal justly with God. "Bring ye 
the whole tithes into the storehouse, that there may be food in 
my house, and prove me now herewith, saith Jehovah of 
hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and 
pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough 
to receive it?" (Mai. 3:10.) In the face of such a challenge 
shall we talk with fear and trembling of the tithe? "Give 
and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, 
shaken together, running over, shall they give into your 
bosom." (Luke 6:38.) Are we willing to let go of ourselves 
and simply believe this wondrous word? "Seek ye first His 
kingdom and His righteousness; and all these things shall be 
added unto you." (Matt. 6:33.) Yet are we afraid to give 
God's work the right of way! "God loveth a cheerful giver." 
(2 Cor. 9:8.) Of course he does, for such an one is like God! 
Who among us covets the resemblance to the Most High that 
comes of the heart that is open and the hand that is free? 
Thank God the number of such increases but vast numbers 
are still without the unspeakable joy of the faithful steward, 
eager to make returns because conscious that he is handling 
his Master's treasure in such a way as to increase his hold- 
ings in the earth. 

Impelling Motives 

Beyond all that has been said about involving sacred mo- 
tives, let a few more words find place as this appeal comes to 
its conclusion. 

In the first place let there be in mind the pleasure of the 



CHARLES S. MEDBURY 327 

Lord. Sacred as the responsibilities of stewardship are, the 
Christian steward will miss what is of incalculable worth if 
he moves only under the constraint of a duty call. It is 
great to do one's duty but a duty is never well done until the 
sense of obligation yields to sense of privilege. Let the Chris- 
tian steward, therefore, have in mind that by his faithful re- 
turns to the Lord he may make Jesus glad. If this thought 
once really grips a life it will sap every bit of pleasure from 
the mere hoarding of funds. Thinking of the pleasure of the 
Lord the struggle a man will have will be to keep anything 
back with which to continue his business and to promote legit- 
imate investments. His joy will not be in having or holding, 
but in giving. Surely this motive has not been urged as it 
should be, or it would not be necessary to plead for gifts as it 
now is. Let us sound this note with new emphasis. Let us 
lift stewardship from the plane of obligation to the plane of 
holiest privilege. What could a man ask in all the earth more 
than to have it within his power to make glad the Son of God? 
And the faithful steward does this. 

In the second place let men understand the fellowship to 
which they are invited when they are called to lines of Chris- 
tian stewardship. He who makes just returns to God comes 
into comradeship with heroes and martyrs of the faith. He 
who counts earth's treasures of today secondary walks the 
highways of service with those who thought nothing of prop- 
erty confiscation in the days of the early church. And at his 
right hand and at his left are those who have gone to the far 
lands of earth counting everything loss for Christ's sake. He 
has the right, because he is not bounded by houses or lands or 
stocks or bonds or farms or banks or stores or factories, to 
think of himself as linked with those who are the truly free 
of all the earth. What is it to be great in any line of life as 
compared with being great in sacrifice? Everything a man 
keeps he will lose. Everything he gives he keeps through all 
eternity. And the faithful steward of today will by and by 
walk the streets of the city of God, rich beyond all naming, 
in the treasures of the Lord's approval, while those, rich 



328 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

here, but who waste God's goods will enter eternity as pau- 
pers. Let those who want to stand with the truly great enter 
the fellowship that faithful stewardship yields. 

And in the last place, as a motive that breaks the heart, and 
prostrates a man before God, there is the need of the world. 
And one among us recently has so bowed to this motive that 
his simple, earnest life has thrilled a brotherhood. Who can 
read the words of R. A. Doan, faithful steward of trust funds 
that he is, and not feel the tug of the greater life. This man 
has been impelled to a new sense of stewardship by a revela- 
tion of need that some way must be brought to all of the 
Disciples of the Lord. Hear him as he says "If some good 
angel were to say to me that God would grant one specific re- 
quest of mine, and that this privilege would be given only 
once during my life, I would unhesitatingly pray that I might 
be given the power to reveal to American Christian business 
men the opportunity for investment in mission work in foreign 
fields. During these months in which I have been in the midst 
of a Christless people the deep conviction of our responsibil- 
ity for them has been borne in upon me in an overwhelming 
way; and in an equally convincing manner have I come to 
feel that we are not meeting this great task with the conse- 
cration the situation demands." And hear him again, in very 
heart cry, as he adds, "Sitting tonight in the midst of a 
heathenism darker than anything ever painted for me by 
those who knew, I have nothing so precious that I would not 
give it if I could be assured that by that means my brethren in 
America who have it in their power to minister to these in the 
name of Christ could be made to see the hopeless millions 
marching on without hope or joy or rest." Such is the cry 
of a marvelously awakened life. Such is the word from one 
quickened to sacrificial service by the true motives of steward- 
ship. Such is the call the Master is sounding to every one 
who bears his name. May eagerly responsive life make glad 
the earth and heaven. 



BYRDINE AKERS ABBOTT 

HP HE word "wholesome" is not a bad word with which to characterize 
■*■ the ministry of B. A. Abbott. He has illustrated the value of this 
quality in the steady progress of the work wherever he has served. This 
is one reason why he has never been a peripatetic pastor. Artemus Ward 
said he admired G. Washington mainly because "he never slopped over. " 
This can be truly said of Mr. Abbott. He does not "slop over." By 
genuine, solid work, he carries success forward, fortifying each step as 
he advances, and by this means makes permanent every victory won, in- 
creasing the influence of his ministry year by year. 

B. A. Abbott was born in Abbott, Craig Co., Virginia, January 26, 
1866. His grandfather, Phillip B. Williams, was one of the earliest min- 
isters of the Christian church and a pioneer in that section. 

He was educated in the public schools of Virginia, at Milligan College, 
Tenn., and at the University of Virginia. 

Was pastor of three country churches: Pembroke, Spruce Eun and 
Clover Hollow, in Giles County, Virginia; served one year as District 
Evangelist for Alleghany Co-operation; taught school at Abbott, Va., 
and Newcastle, Va.; was pastor of the Christian church at Charlottes- 
ville, Va., for six years; at Harlem Avenue Christian church, Baltimore, 
Md., for sixteen years; at Union Avenue Christian church, St. Louis, 
Mo., seven and a half years. 

He has also used his pen somewhat freely, especially in writing for the 
public journals. While living in Baltimore, he wrote often for the daily 
press, and since he removed to St. Louis, he has written editorials for 
several papers, especially for The Christian-Evangelist. He has also 
shown considerable ability in contributions to the literary department 
in reviewing books, etc. He is the author of "The Life of Chapman 
S. Lucas. ' ' 

However, his chief work has been that of a pastor, and in this he has 
achieved an honorable success. 

As a preacher Mr. Abbott's style is exegetical rather than oratorical, 
expository rather than topical. He is a faithful teacher of the Divine 
word, and though liberal in every fiber of his nature, he believes that 
the safest liberty is in following the Word of God. He is not only a 
most excellent pastor and preacher, but he is also a wise counsellor and 
manager of the general affairs of the churches. In a sentence, he is a 
splendid all-around man, and is deservedly popular throughout the entire 
Brotherhood. 

329 



330 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Becently, Mr. Abbott was appointed editor-in-chief of The Christian- 
Evangelist, having resigned his pastorate of the Union Avenue church. 
The Brotherhood, as a whole, is to be congratulated on Mr. Abbott's de- 
cision to accept this important post of service. 




■ >,- * 




Yows faithfully, 



THE CALL OF THE DIVINE 

By B. A. Abbott 
Text.— Romans 8:14-17. 

WE have heard of the call of the wild and of the call of 
the blood. The call of the wild is the play upon the soul 
of elemental forces which tend to drag us back into primitive 
conditions. The call of the blood is the tribal instinct or at- 
tachment and is the center of gravity which holds together 
tribes, peoples, and nations. It is good or bad according to 
the clan or the circle. Every sentient being is moved by it. 
The call of the blood is more powerful than the call of the 
wild. Sometimes it is the strong, beautiful, tie of natural 
affection. Sometimes it is comradeship, sometimes friendship. 
Sometimes it is the human love between a man and a woman 
which renews and recreates the race. Sometimes it is patri- 
otism which makes the heroes who can sacrifice their fortunes 
and lives on the altar of their country. 

To these urges may be added "the call of the road." This 
is what is called wanderlust and it makes its mysterious ap- 
peal to the soul of youth and to youthful souls. It is the 
bloom of wonder which is the glory and freshness of the 
world. It exercises such a spell that it bears men away from 
home, friends, ease, respectability and sends them to be wan- 
derers on the face of the earth. It has possessed whole tribes 
and caused them to change locations. It is the instinct of the 
traveler. It is the germ and beginning of new nations. 

There is a fourth call which burns like a flame in the soul. 
We shall think of it as the call of the divine. It is set forth 
rh these words of the text: "Ye have received the spirit of 
adoption, whereby we cry 'Abba, Father.' " It is the finest 
aspiration of which humanity is capable. The record of it 
runs through the Bible. It is expressed in such passionate 

331 



332 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

spiritual poetry as the 42nd Psalm where the writer cries out, 
no doubt having in mind the figure of a wounded stag he had 
been hunting in one of the dry ravines for water, "As the 
hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after 
Thee, God." It is a creative power and has inspired those 
immortal literatures upon which the spirit of man has fed for 
millenniums and which will support him until we see God face 
to face. It has builded temples, erected churches, reared all 
the altars, and made all the ordinances of religion. It is the 
inner power which moves saints to beautiful devotions, phil- 
anthropists to good deeds, and friends to lovingkindness. It 
sheds the halo of character upon human personality as light 
hovers about flowers. It is the prayer spirit that searches for 
communion. It is the filial spirit which cries out "Abba, 
Father, ' ' and gives its possessor the sense of a divine paternity 
and makes him know that in the midst of the fallen and the 
ruined, and in all wanderings in the famine country of unhap- 
piness or even of sin, he is the child of God. For as the memo- 
ries of home forever linger in the heart of the wanderer and 
give him the sense that somewhere there is shelter and rest 
and a place of peace where all tumultuous experiences and 
feelings are hushed into perfect satisfaction, so in the heart 
of man, however far away he may seem to be, there is the 
homing instinct which draws him to God. A poet picked up 
a shell on a mountain top and held it to his ear. In fancy he 
heard the echo-music of the distant ocean. It was the shell 
sighing for its far away home, the sea. So does the filial 
spirit ever make man long for God. Moses "The Man of 
God," when the shadow of the mystical change loomed above 
him and he was going into the strange land from which he 
would not return, cried, "Lord, Thou hast been our dwelling- 
place in all generations." Nearly two thousand years later 
St. Augustine, another soul who had sounded the great deeps 
of life, exclaimed: "Thou hast made us for Thyself and our 
hearts can find no rest outside of Thee." Even stronger was 
the word of that intense mystic of the Middle Ages, Meister 
Eckhart: "I would rather be in hell and have God, than in 
heaven and not have God." 



BYRDINE AKERS ABBOTT 333 

This is the call of the divine. It is wonderful. It must be 
nothing less than the personal influence of God and it kindles 
in man's soul the pure and purifying name we know as re- 
ligion. Beside it all other passions are weak and all other in- 
fluences as nothing. 

This idea has many practical suggestions for the serious 
work of living. 

We may treat it as the key to human nature. It explains 
man to himself. It is the root of inspiration to all good works 
and noble practices. It is the psychology of optimism. We 
sometimes try to establish a connection with some great an- 
cestor. That is not vanity; it is worth while. It has a good 
influence upon a man to know that the people from whom he 
sprang played their part in life well. It makes a difference — 
much difference — whether we believe we came from dust or 
from divinity. Both science and theology have done what 
they could at times to destroy man 's belief in his own essential 
grandeur. Theology has talked of the depravity of man; 
science of his animal origin, but in the book of God there is 
an old genealogy, like a chain of gold, running back to the 
far beginning thus: "Who was the son of Abraham . . . 
the son of Enos, the son of Seth, the son of Adam, the son 
of God/' I contend that history proves the old genealogy 
true. This sublime claim has been justified in the growth of 
the race and achievements of man. 

The Bible seeks to make man reverence himself; it teaches 
his greatness and preeminent significance in the universe. Of 
course, there is a wrong care of self and a right care of self. 
The right care of self is proper self-respect. When man has 
that he will begin to use his life and develop himself in a 
worthy way. No man can do much until he prizes his own 
dignity and worth. In the old days God said to the prophet 
who had fallen on his face before him, "Son of man, stand 
upon thy feet and I will speak to thee." Stand up and be a 
man and visions and messages will come. Stand on your feet 
for you did not originate in a clod but in Deity. 

This view of life defines the boundaries of aim and conduct, 



334 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

suggests the law of restraint, and gives victory in the hour 
of temptation. It elevated the slave Joseph into royal and 
chivalrous manhood and delivered him from the wily tempt- 
ress who would have sullied his soul with sin. It supported 
him in the weariest hours and saved him from despair when 
he was in prison. The thought that one is a child of God will 
restrain him in his wildest joys and sweeten life in its darkest 
moments. It is the surest means of safety when we are lured 
into the wilderness by the call of the world. A boy making 
his first great adventure — the adventure into the world beyond 
the guides and shelter of home — will remember his mother 
and that memory will form an armor of steel which no fiery 
dart can pierce. In the same way, aye in a better, religion, 
which is the presence of God in human experience, supports 
guides, inspires, shelters, and elevates man. When one re- 
members that he is a child of God he cannot easily do wrong. 
Religion is the secret of ethics. 

The call of the divine challenges us to plan large things for 
our lives. We can dare a grand goal, for God made us in his 
own image and we have within us conscious longings and 
prophecies of wonderful possibilities. The old saying is true 
that "He aims too low who aims beneath the sky." Loav aim 
is sin. Joseph Cook used to reason that the instincts are 
prophecies; the fish's fins were made for the water; the birds' 
wings for the air; hunger suggests that somewhere there is 
food; love that there is an object to be loved: and the longing 
for the summerland is the assurance to the bird that its long 
flight southward will bring it to the flowers and singing of 
eternal summer. When Jesus Christ said "In my Father's 
house are many mansions, if it were not so, I would have told 
you," he gave endorsement to the idea that the sweetest 
dreams and highest aspirations of the human soul are true. 
No height is so far away it may not be achieved and no holy 
grail so hidden that it may not be discovered by man. Every 
man may rise if he will. 

If any one should say to me in reply to these reasonings: 
"I do not partake of them; I have no desire for anything 



BYRDINE AKERS ABBOTT 335 

further than just what I see in this world. I want to have a 
few friends, not too many; I want to have such a station in 
life that I can 'go the gait.' I am not conscious of wanting 
anything but the creature comforts;" I would tell him that he 
is stifling the best part of his nature and destroying the only 
power which can lift him above the beasts of the field. That 
is what our Savior meant when he spoke of losing the soul. 
When the famous journalist, W. T. Stead, was preparing his 
little book "Hymns That Have Helped," he wrote to a num- 
ber of men of scholarship and achievement asking them for 
a list of hymns that had helped them. In the reply of Mr. 
Grant Allen, a scientific writer, he said, "I do not remember 
any hymn, or, for the matter of that, any text of Scripture, 
maxim, or line of poetry, that was ever of the least use to me. 
I never needed help other than physical or monetary." He 
seemed in that to deny himself a soul and indicated that he 
had allowed the chief things of existence to lose their place 
in his being and plans. It was quite characteristic of the ma- 
terialistic philosophy which has lost its vision of God. There 
are those today who can write delightfully of bugs and beetles, 
and tell the habits of wasps and butterflies but are not able 
to utter any clear word about God. What shall we think of a 
human being who becomes acquainted with insects but does 
not know God — who allows those longings that lift the spirit 
across the chasm of space and death to the realities of immor- 
tality to die out of his soul? That strips life of all its higher 
meanings and tramples its crown of glory in the mire ? 

If one would keep his soul sensitive to the call of the divine 
he must cultivate the listening heart and obey the voices that 
speak to him. We possess no gift we will not lose if we do not 
use it. This tragedy is, alas, often seen in human life. The 
gift of music, of painting, or oratory, or even the greater gift 
of sympathy and the genius for kind deeds, and greatest of 
all, the desire to pray, may be neglected and die. Their loss 
leaves one morally and spiritually bankrupt. That is the final 
and most tragical collapse that may come to a life. 

Do we desire to live under the spell of the divine? 



336 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

We can only realize that state of satisfaction in Jesus 
Christ. He is the call of God to wandering, fainting, sinful 
and sinning human beings. Through all the strident and 
jangling voices of earth and time persists the one clear call 
of the gospel of love and redemption. In him we have the 
fullness of God. All the voices of divine appeal are heard in 
his word. He shows the goal of manhood in his own char- 
acter. By his life and by his revelation he interprets those 
undefined longings of man's heart that have made him strug- 
gle toward the light and toward the heights. He satisfies 
earth's hunger for love Fy the sufferings of the cross. Over 
against the change and decay of time he sets the fact of the 
resurrection. His perpetual presence in the world is proved 
daily by exalted experiences and the noble deeds done in his 
name. He is the living Christ and he is with his people all 
the days even unto the end of the world. 

"No fable old, nor mystic lore, 
Nor dream of bards and seers, 
No dead fact stranded on the shore 
Of the oblivious years — 

"But warm, sweet, tender, even yet 
A present help is He 
And faith has still its Olivet 
And love its Galilee. ' ' 

He is the day-star in the heart of the individual and the 
morning star on the horizon of history, hailing the dawning 
of the new day forever rising upon humanity. 

To the lost He is the way; to the ignorant He is the truth; 
to the dying He is the life — to us all He is the wisdom of 
God and the power of God. We answer the call of God when 
we enter his experiences. "If so be that we suffer with him, 
that we may also be glorified together." Our attitude to Him 
determines our destiny. Each soul must choose its own for- 
ever. One may elect that he will be controlled by the divine 
nature or that he will be under the deadening spell of the 
material. Which shall it be ? 



PETER AINSLIE 

P ETER AINSLIE was born at Dunnsville, Virginia, June 3, 1867. He 
bears the name of his father and grandfather, both of whom were 
ministers among the Disciples. He was educated at the College of the 
Bible, Lexington, Ky., and later traveled and studied in Europe. Drake 
University conferred on him the degree of Doctor of Divinity in 1911, 
Yale University in 1914 and Bethany College conferred on him the 
degree of Doctor of Laws in 1914. His only permanent pastorate has 
been at the Christian Temple, Baltimore, Md., which dates from Octo- 
ber 1, 1891. In 1899 he founded Seminary House, which is a school 
for Bible study; with this is connected the Girls' Club — a self-governing 
Club — for girls who come from the rural districts to live in the city. He 
was president of the National Convention of Disciples in Topeka in 
1910. He has been president of the Council on Christian Union of the 
Disciples of Christ since 1910. He was appointed in 1913 by the Prot- 
estant Episcopal Church as one of a deputation of three to visit Great 
Britain and Ireland in the interest of the "World Conference on Faith 
and Order. He is editor The Christian Union Quarterly, Baltimore, and 
contributing editor The Christian Work, New York. He is a trustee 
of the Church Peace Union, founded by Andrew Carnegie and was a 
delegate to the Church Peace Conference at Constance, Germany, in 1914. 
He is chairman of the Commission on Sunday Observance of the Fed- 
eral Council of Churches of Christ in America and also a member of the 
Commission on Federated Movements. He is a member of the Advisory 
Board of the American Encyclopedia of Christianity; a member of the 
American Society of Church History; a trustee of the College of the 
Bible, Lexington, Ky.; of Bethany College, Bethany, W. Va., and of Dis- 
ciples' Divinity House, Chicago; and director of the Christian Board of 
Publication. He is the author of a dozen books, the best known being, 
"God and Me," "My Brother and I," "The Message of the Disciples 
for the Union of the Church" (Yale Lectures), and "Christ or Napoleon, 
Which?" 

This record shows that Dr. Ainslie is a busy man. These positions 
prove that ho is a willing servant, and that his services are appreciated 
in a wide field of influence. 

Though rather small in stature, he has a commanding appearance in the 
pulpit, and notwithstanding his voice is not strong, his articulation is so 
clear and his utterance so easy, he is heard with pleasure in our largest 
auditoriums. Few men among our present day preachers can command 
the appreciative attention of an audience more readily than the subject 

337 



338 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

of this sketch. Of his sermons it can be truthfully said, while they may 
not always rise to the highest level, they never degenerate into question- 
able ideals for the sake of temporary popular effect. He always speaks 
with dignity and impresses one with the fact that he believes his mes- 
sage is from God. Dr. Ainslie 's success in his long pastorate in Baltimore 
is proof of ability to hold his people. 




Your friend, 




THE PAIN OF THINKING 

By Peter Ainslie 

Text. — While I was musing the fire burned: then spake I with 
my tongue. — Psalm 39:3. 

HEKE is a text of wondrous beauty — so picturesque that 
artists have found in it a subject for a picture; so 
musical that poets have been moved by it to put into verse 
what they felt; so profound that philosophers have observed 
in it new paths for their thinking, and yet so commonplace 
that any one can say that it is his own experience, for who of 
us has not sat alone, considering thoughtfully his disappoint- 
ments, afflictions or grievances? The longer we reflected in 
the loneliness of our meditations, either the flame of an abiding 
love was fed by the living presence of God and we were sub- 
missive, or the fire of discontent was fed with the fuel of re- 
sentment and we were ill-tempered. From our musing came 
our speech, whether that speech was good or bad. 

Out of these ordinary experiences we find the common law 
of thinking. We think deeply, the passion to know, or to do, 
or to be, burns in us and our tongues give utterance to our 
thoughts. In the presence of the burning bush, Moses said: 
"I will turn aside now and see . . . why the bush is not 
burnt." That is to say, I will think this out. Jesus said: 
"Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free." 
We are to think ourselves into freedom, knowledge of the truth 
being the mental route by which the soul attains freedom from 
every entanglement of the past, as well as from unholy en- 
vironments of the present. It is a difficult highway. To think 
is one of the painful experiences of life. At the conclusion of 
one of his lectures in Paris, Mr. Bergson met a beautiful woman 
who said: "Oh, my dear Mr. Bergson, how you have made me 
think!" Bowing for forgiveness he answered: "Pardon, 

339 



340 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

madame, pardon." Painful as it may be, nevertheless thinking 
is one of the necessities of right living, attended with heroic 
energy and requiring faith, hope and love. 

All around us in the living things that God has made is a 
testimony that challenges us to think. In general terms we 
call the science of life biology. By science I mean knowledge 
that is gained by exact observation and correct thinking, being 
tested and systematized. At the threshold of all inquiry lies 
necessarily the question as to the nature and character of 
knowledge, for knowledge alone is not a sufficient witness, if 
by knowledge is meant simply an array of facts. We would 
not speak of pure knowledge any more than we would speak 
of pure gold, meaning that there was only gold in the metal. 
No coin is pure gold. If it were it would not wear. Alloy is 
in it to harden it, making it serviceable. So of knowledge. 
Faith is the yeast in the raw material of knowledge and so 
these two elements — knowledge and faith — become the wit- 
ness bearers in the pain of thinking. I must know God, whom 
to know is eternal life. I must believe, for without faith it is 
impossible for me to please him. 

I take you with me into the forest, where stand great oaks 
and elms. There lies on the ground an acorn with its distinct 
pathway leading into an oak. The marvel is that sometimes 
the acorn does not produce an elm. Instead, it travels along 
the one hundred thousandth tree path into an oak, as the 
egg of the butterfly travels along the two hundred and fifty 
thousandth insect route into a butterfly — never to any- 
thing else. Neither in the acorn nor the egg are all the parts 
of its final product there in miniature, but along the way is 
the formation and differentiation of the structures and organs 
not previously existent as such. It is so with our thinking. 
One thinks in one period of his life and then an entirely new 
idea springs forth in another period. After some time these 
ideas are found to be linked together, as the oak to the acorn 
and the butterfly to the egg. It is so in the thought of cen- 
turies, when one generation thinks and a succeeding one goes 
further in its thinking. There are always unexplored regions 



PETER AINSLIE 341 

beyond the spiritual explorer. He drops into a deadly heresy 
who contends that his generation holds the finale of truth, 
especially is this true as applied to truth in the realm of re- 
ligion. The reactionary element in any field is always an 
element of danger and it has been especially so in the Church. 
It is no credit to a man to boast of his conservatism, neither is 
it the characteristic of the humble mind to boast of its ; liber- 
alism. Both of these are vanities ; but the duty of every mind 
is to go beyond where it is in spiritual things, irrespective 
of the cost. These stages of advancement have usually 
been attended with severe trial. The hull of the acorn breaks 
as does the outer covering of the egg. Here are the 
tightly closed sepals of the green bud. These are torn apart 
by nature's progress to give place to the rose. Each succes- 
sive step is nearer the product of the full blossom. God's 
hand is on the path of the acorn and the egg of the butterfly. 
How much more then does he seek to have a place in our 
thinking that all our thoughts may be toward him? 

Survival depends upon obedience. The acorn must travel 
the established route or die. "We must think by established 
laws. Chance is incapable of producing continuity. Order in- 
volves both the existence and presence of God, consequently we 
are in a world of both the natural and supernatural — natural 
in being the objective expression of God, as we see in the 
majesty and beauty of the sky, the rolling of the sea and the 
blooming of flowers: the supernatural in the manner of it all 
being upheld by God. Thinking means the finding of God's 
thoughts and consequently breaking away from the crude 
thoughts of our materialistic environments. In the great proc- 
ess of making, man is himself the outcome of the travail of the 
universe and unlike all other things that are made, he alone 
catches in his bosom the hope of immortality, consequently 
mortality is the essential prerequisite of immortality. Here is 
the school room and we must practice open-mindedness, lest 
our front windows become closed, leaving us only the back 
windows to look out upon an unprophetic past. 

There is no history but has its testimony, awakening us to 



342 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

knowledge and radiating in the hope of attaining the far off 
ideal. In the book entitled: "The Corner on Harley Street," 
Dr. Peter Harding wrote his son, who was considering enter- 
ing the medical profession, "You must ask yourself with all 
the earnestness of a novice at the altar-vigil, am I prepared to 
know? . . . The best of humanity are turning slowly but 
very surely toward the man who knows. Are you prepared to 
become such a man?" History is crowded with both the dis- 
appointing and satisfactory attempts to think. Some have 
been afraid to think beyond what others have thought, as 
though infallibility rested there, or perhaps they saw in the 
distance what Dante saw written over the Inferno: "Abandon 
hope, all ye who enter here." This has too frequently been 
the history of the Church — great staggering sin that has set us 
whetting our tools of the Middle Ages as well as those 
of the last generation, when we ought to have been 
thinking our way to Jesus in giving food to the hungry, 
better tenements for the poor, establishing social justice and 
practicing brotherhood to all mankind. When the mind ceases 
to think it stagnates, like water that ceases to flow ; it decays like 
flowers that cease to bloom. Some one has said: "Follow truth, 
though it takes you over the Niagara." It may take you to 
Calvary. It took Jesus there. Thought is the principle of life 
and one must think if he would grow. 

Had obstructions prevailed in the path of thinking, we 
would know little about astronomy, geography, medicine, sur- 
gery, art or even religion. If men in their desire for the 
knowledge of medicine had not thought, in spite of protests, 
we would still be under the shadow of the ancient and ele- 
mentary school of Hippocrates at Cos. So of religion. Some 
like Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas forbade the study 
of the evidence of the resurrection of Jesus, regarding it as 
too sacred for investigation. History abounds in instances like 
this. Nothing is too sacred in the life of Jesus to be investi- 
gated. He invited it, saying: "Come and see." Lift every cur- 
tain from the manger to the ascension. Crowd in upon every 
scene with a thousand questions and be prepared to follow 



PETER AINSLIE 343 

your conclusion. Be free — free in the atmosphere of a genuine 
companionship with Christ, which is satisfied with nothing less 
than oneness of life with Him. The issue is too great to be 
influenced by the superstition of the Middle Ages. My peace 
here, my life yonder, hangs upon my knowledge of Jesus Christ 
and the hope that He gives me of immortality and external life. 
"When the mind awakes we can no more suppress its thinking 
than we can hold back the tides of the ocean. Painful as it 
may be, we must think, whether we break with sacred tradi- 
tions, honored customs and dear friends. If the world would 
be made better, there must be forerunners in thinking. 

Against intellectual indolence paths have been surveyed 
that have been costly to those who dared to carry the sur- 
veyors' chain and instruments. See Pathagoras, Copernicus, 
Kepler, Galileo and Newton in science, and Cimabue and Giotto 
in art. In religion see "Wyclif, Huss, Savonarola, Luther, Cal- 
vin, Zwingle, the Wesleys and the Campbells and others who 
have followed them in going beyond their day. If Columbus had 
not dared to think and wear chains for his thinking, the Amer- 
ican continent might still be an unexplored wilderness. How 
the world ridiculed Marquis de la Place when he affirmed that 
there was light before the sun was outlined and Torricelli's 
discovering that the air had weight, but they stood firm until 
the world accepted their affirmations. There have always been 
a few who have dared to think irrespective of pain and in a few 
generations the world has been brought up to those thinkers. 
It must be borne in mind that every fresh truth is received un- 
willingly. To expect otherwise is to look for a miracle. Every 
new truth or restatement of an old truth has been born into the 
world with pangs and tribulations. But God must be known 
and we must seek in history for his footprints — in the history 
of our little lives as well as in the history of the great nations 
of the world, out of which he is seeking to make a world to be 
filled with his glory. "What a glorious hope ! 

The personal experience of individual souls is a testimony 
of such character that no authority can be substituted for it. 
Authority should never supplant personal experience; it may 



344 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

supplement it. Love is the language of the soul's communion 
with God. Knowledge comes to express itself in personal trans- 
actions with God that have resulted from musings in the quiet. 
I take you into the laboratory. I do not mean the laboratory 
of a university, or some chemical establishment. Let us ob- 
serve the fisherman down by the river bank. He is trying to 
catch fish, but he does not succeed. Perhaps he has the wrong 
bait or the wrong kind of hook. But he changes his methods 
and instruments of fishing and after working faithfully all 
day, he goes home in the evening with a long string of fish. 
The scientific laboratory is of the same character. The man 
of religious faith is likewise seeking for results which will ex- 
press themselves in a stronger faith, a brighter hope and an 
abiding love, so that he too in the evening will go home with 
the finest results of the soul. That is what thinking by the law 
of God means. 

An old Greek maxim said: "Look to the end." Standing at 
the window of our spiritual vision, the soul is not satisfied un- 
til its vision sweeps to the very end of man's destiny. Multi- 
tudes today are pressing up to the windows of the other world 
and inquiring, "What of the future? With what body shall I 
be raised? Will I know my loved ones? Will I be absolutely 
free from the power of sin? How nearly will I be like God? 
The answer cannot be in the speculative. I must know Whom 
I believe and my answer must be true to the great thought paths 
that stretch out before me. New experiences call for repeated 
adjustments. I must move up. It is a biological necessity. 
' ' Grow ' ' is the call of God to the soul as well as to the flowers 
of the garden and the trees of the forest. There must be found 
in each individual a mutual temperamental balancing, so that 
the mystical, the practical, the emotional and the intellectual 
shall find their proper places in order that the soul may come 
to those heights from which it can get the proper angle to be- 
hold God, itself and others. It is a painful route, but the attain- 
ment to such a height turns all the pain into joy, as Jesus 
promised. 

From whatever point in nature, history or experience we 
start, if we follow the way, like the acorn in its path, the scien- 



PETER AINSLIE 345 

tific pioneer in his thinking, or in the deep things of the soul's 
experiences — and not stop in our search for God — He has 
promised to give the answer to our knocking. "While I was 
musing the fire burned; then spake I with my tongue." 

"I know not what the future hath, 
Of marvel or surprise; 
Assured alone that life and death 
His mercy underlies. 

"And so beside the silent sea 
I wait the muffled oar ; 
No harm from Him can come to me 
On ocean or on shore. 

"I know not where His islands lift 
Their fronded palms in air; 
I only know I cannot drift 
Beyond His love and care. 

"And Thou, Lord, by Whom are seen 
Thy creatures as they be; 
Forgive me if too close I lean 
My human heart on Thee." 



ALLAN B. PHILPUTT 

A LLAN B. PHILPUTT was born near Shelbyville, Tennessee, May 6, 
-**• 1856. After the Civil "War his father moved to southern Indiana. 
Allan was the oldest of five children, three of whom are still living, the 
next younger of whom is J. M. Philputt, a well-known preacher among 
the Disciples and the surviving sister is the wife of Peter C. Cauble, also 
a preacher. 

The subject of this sketch attended the schools of Washington County, 
Ind., and became for a short time a country school teacher. In 1876 he 
entered Indiana University where he was graduated in 1880 and from 
the same institution he took his A.M. degree in 1886. 

In September, 1880, he married Miss Anna Maxwell, of Bloomington, 
Indiana, whose father, Dr. Darwin Maxwell, had for many years been a 
trustee of the University, as had his father, Dr. David H. Maxwell, 
before him. 

In 1879 he was called to the pastorate of the Christian church in 
Bloomington, which he held for about seven years, during which time 
a new church edifice was erected. In 1886 he was called to a position as 
assistant instructor in Latin and Greek in Indiana University and after 
teaching two years he went to Harvard University for a year's graduate 
study. 

In 1889 he accepted a call to the First church, of Philadelphia, where 
he remained nearly ten years. During this pastorate the congregation 
removed to a much better location and finer building. Here the church 
prospered and greatly increased its influence. Dr. Philputt was well 
known and prominent in Christian work in the city of Philadelphia and 
was twice elected president of the Pennsylvania C. E. Union. While 
living in that city he took two years of work as a special student in 
Greek and Hebrew at the Episcopal Divinity School. In 1898 he accepted 
a call to the Central Christian church, of Indianapolis, and is still its 
pastor. His work in Indianapolis has grown greatly. The membership 
of the church is about seventeen hundred and the Sunday school is at 
present the largest in the city, having an average attendance of more 
than seven hundred. 

Dr. Philputt is one of the Board of Directors of Butler College, also 
a director of the Christian Board of Publication, of St. Louis, Mo. In 
1900 he was granted the honorary degree of LL.D. by Drake University. 

The foregoing facts clearly indicate the grounds of Dr. Philputt 's suc- 
cessful career. First of all he has been a student, using every opportunity 
to increase his store of useful knowledge. He has always kept his mind 

347 



348 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

and heart open to every source of information which offered helpfulness 
in his life work. Along with this he has been careful to concentrate and 
make permanent his influence. He has not been a "rolling stone that 
gathers no moss. ' ' He has held comparatively only a few pastorates, and 
his last is the most successful of all. The Central church in Indianapolis 
should not be measured by its present membership, or present local in- 
fluence. While these are considerable, the church has been and is still 
a seed church, furnishing the initial membership of many other churches, 
both in and out of Indianapolis; and yet it has always maintained a 
strong membership at home, and is today one of the most useful and in- 
fluential churches in the capitol city. 

It is a significant fact and it ought to be emphasized, that all the 
great churches of the Disciples, have been built up by long pastorates. 
If there is a single exception to this rule, it is not known to me. 

Dr. Philputt's mental characteristics all tend to thoroughness in what 
he aims to do. His sermons are forceful, exhaustive, useful, rather than 
brilliant, or even popular in the modern understanding of that term. His 
preaching, though liberal, is true to the gospel message. 



SOME OF THE SPIRITUAL 
VALUES OF LIFE 

By Allan B. Philputt 

Text. — "Then laid they their hands on them and they received 
the Holy Spirit. Now when Simon saw that through the 
laying on of the Apostles' hands, the Holy Spirit was 
given, he offered them money, saying, Give me this power 
that on whomsoever I lay my hands he may receive the 
Holy Spirit. But Peter said unto him, Thy silver perish 
with thee, because thou hast thought to obtain the gift of 
God with money. — Acts 8:17-20. 

THE New Testament takes a sensible view of money. Its 
valne is not disparaged. Thrift is not condemned. To ac- 
quire money honestly does no violence to the spirit of the 
Gospel. The poor man and the man of wealth enter the King- 
dom of Heaven upon precisely the same terms. Each must 
humble himself to the dimensions of the needle's eye. 

Money has its place, a very necessary place in human so- 
ciety. In its proper place it is nowhere in the New Testament 
condemned, but praised rather. Jesus recognized in many of 
his sayings its value, or at least implied it, though he did not 
turn aside to acquire it for himself. In the parable of the 
Pounds, and also of the Talents, the pursuit of it is used to 
illustrate the method of acquiring moral values. The kingdom 
of heaven is as a merchantman seeking goodly pearls. The 
Good Samaritan made a noble use of his money and was highly 
set forth for doing so by our Lord. The little company of the 
disciples had a treasurer. They went into the city to buy 
bread. 

It happens that in a few instances Jesus rebuked men's 
greed, and sought to correct their false notions about the rel- 
ative value of money. From these instances it has been in- 

349 



350 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

ferred by some that Christianity is inimical to thrift, enter- 
prise, and material acquisition. Nothing conld be farther 
from the truth. Instead of despising money the New Testa- 
ment stamps it as having even spiritual value. My father 
used to impress upon his boys that they should appreciate 
the " value of a dollar." What money he had came hard, as 
it seems to come with all farmers. When I wanted to go away 
to school he was fearful that I would not be economical, that 
I would not appreciate the value of a dollar. My father was 
right. A dollar has value. It has at the lowest a material 
value and a young man has no right to recklessly spend it. 
Dollars must be earned by somebody. The fruit of honest toil 
is sacred. We boys used to wink at the old men talking so 
much about the value of a dollar. Since I have reared a 
family and educated children I see their point of view. I have 
lost my wink. 

Money has a spiritual value. It is only when one is trying 
to make it do what it cannot do, that he runs counter to the 
teachings of the Master. When men carried on merchandise 
in the Temple precincts, when they bought and sold in the 
place of prayer he used severe measures. When he saw that 
a rich young ruler was wedded to his possessions above 
everything else he told him to sell all and give to the poor. 
This command was not in contempt of wealth. Jesus would 
have been the last one in the world to unload on the poor 
something inferior and hurtful. It was stamping money 
with spiritual value, for when is wealth so beautiful as when 
used to benefit and uplift the poor ? 

The value of a dollar! Would that all men appreciated it. 
People spend their dollars for that which is not bread and 
for that which satisfieth not. The pulpit should not disdain 
to speak of these things. See what transmutations the dol- 
lar may undergo. We pay taxes. Where do we get more for 
our money? A great free country whose flag is over us all, 
a city full of light and charm throwing every protection 
around property, health, and life, affording hospitals for the 
sick, charity for the poor, education for our children — these 



ALLAN B. PHILPUTT 351 

are some of the blessings which money brings. Or, suppose 
a man saves his dollars and builds a home. Here his children 
grow up. The memories and traditions of the fireside bless 
them all through life. The hearthstone is God's altar, the 
home is a temple of his. While dollars alone cannot make a 
home, they do make it possible. Think you they have no 
spiritual value? Has not the home-builder learned the value 
of a dollar even as the boy or girl who wishes to turn it into 
an opportunity for education? Has money given to the sup- 
port of a church no spiritual value? No sensible man would 
want to live in a community that had no church in it — even 
though he never darkened its door himself? I met a man 
recently who had given a large sum for missions and hospital 
work in the foreign field. He seemed very happy over it. 
He considered it a splendid investment. But it will bring him 
no returns in kind. It is a spiritual use of money. Does not 
this man know the value of a dollar? 

I heard one man in our community, ask another how much 
a certain rich man recently deceased, had left. "All he had" 
facetiously replied the other. If so it were sad. It is a com- 
mon saying that a man cannot take his money with him. I 
think he can. It were to upset the highest and best theory 
of values to say that he cannot. The mother working night 
and day to support a fatherless brood surely takes her money 
with her. Mr. Pearson, the Chicago millionaire, who in life 
gave away all his fortune for noble uses, surely did not die 
poor. Mr. Carnegie has been quoted as saying that it is a 
disgrace for a man to die rich. Is it not rather a disgrace 
for a rich man to die poor? That saying of Scripture. "We 
brought nothing into this world and it is certain we can 
carry nothing out," was not written of the soul. 

Among the higher values of life then may be reckoned 
money honestly come by and worthily used. 

Another thing brought out with startling effect in the text 
is the very fundamental value of a right heart. 

Here was where Simon the Sorcerer was all wrong. He 
was a church member, for he had been baptized, but he had 



352 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

not been converted. His heart was not right. We speak of 
tainted money, but we mean a tainted heart. There are some 
things that good money even cannot buy. Simon's money was 
not good money because Simon was not a good man. The 
taint was in him. He had gotten it by imposing upon the 
credulity of people. He was a sham. When Philip came 
speaking truth to the people Simon saw that his hold upon 
them was gone. But a quack is not easily put down. He 
watched Philip in his campaign. He fell into line and "hit 
the sawdust trail." Peter and John came down from Jeru- 
salem to further enlighten and strengthen the converts. They 
prayed with them that they might receive the Holy Spirit. 
To make the occasion more impressive they used a little cere- 
mony — they laid their hands on them and the blessing came. 
This was something Simon could see. The notion of cause 
and effect flashed into his mind at once. He thought within 
himself, "why could not I turn that trick?" He had money. 
The evangelists seemed no doubt to be in need of it. He 
offered them money, not as a free gift for the blessing of 
the Holy Spirit in his own soul, but for the power to confer it 
upon others. The effort to purchase a reputation for holiness 
by giving dollars instead of yielding up the heart did not 
cease with Simon the Sorcerer. Simon shot his bolt but missed 
the mark. He played and lost. It was an instance of money 
in a wrong place. That was a very precious season among 
the converts. They were coming into the everlasting riches 
through humble faith in God, by repentance and obedience 
to the gospel. The atmosphere was one of deep unselfishness 
and sincerity. God was breathing upon them his Holy Spirit. 
His gifts are without price. They cannot be bought with 
money. I think we should still keep some high moments in 
the worship of the Church where the atmosphere of the occa- 
sion is not tremulous with the appeal for money. 

Peter was indignant. "Thy money perish with thee." 
"Thy heart is not right before God." It was a terrible re- 
buke, sounding more like the thunders of Sinai than the 
gentle voice of the Nazarene. It brought the Sorcerer to his 
knees. 



ALLAN B. PHILPUTT 353 

Poor men, these apostles of the kingdom were, but they 
scorned money in this holy service, offered to them from a 
wrong motive. Perhaps if the Church should sometimes rise 
to these heights and refuse money it would get more. How 
far Simon was from the spirit and blessedness of that holy 
hour. How far a wrong heart puts us from all that is fine 
and genuine in the relations of life. An evil heart is the 
saddest of tragedies. It breeds increasing discord, alienation 
and bitterness. A wrong heart is generally very strongly 
wedded to money and the evil of it is that it measures every- 
thing in terms of money. 

The gospel can have no effective lodgment in us until our 
hearts get right. Never was a more important petition sent 
up than that of the Psalmist, " Create in me a clean heart, 
God." The revised version reads, "the eyes of your heart 
being enlightened." All the faculties of man are heightened 
and made more trustworthy if the heart is pure. Judgment, 
understanding, feeling, imagination, all share in the marvel- 
ous strength of a good heart. 

All Judas could say of the box of precious ointment poured 
upon the head of Christ was, "it might have been sold for 
three hundred shillings and given to the poor." What a 
blunder! Mary had just performed a service of love, and 
love eternal was trying to say something to each man there. 
It was too bad that the silence had to be broken with the 
words, "it might have been sold." 

John explains the circumstances by saying that Judas had 
an evil heart. Judas was the treasurer of the band. He kept 
the bag. Like so many of his kind he grew to believe that the 
bag could keep him. Because his heart was evil judgment was 
taken from him. The fact that he set a price on the gift 
shows a lack of the finer appreciation, for it cheapened it. 
All things are cheapened for the man whose heart is not right. 
"The man who cannot see the priceless," says Ainsworth, 
"is quite capable of selling it." 

For all honest and clear judgment, for all appreciation of 
beauty aesthetic or moral, for all self-respect and spiritual 



354 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

power, for the ability to look at the flowers and enjoy their 
fragrance, to look at the stars and be thrilled by their sub- 
limity, to look into the faces of little children and feel no 
shame a pure and upright heart is absolutely indispensable. 

The capacity for friendship may be included among the 
higher values of life, but not that inner-circle kind of friend- 
ship where congenial and selfish souls shut themselves off from 
others. Friendship based upon sympathy and need is what 
is meant, such friendship as brought these high-privileged 
men down to the lowly Samaritans that they might lift them 
up to the standard of the kingdom. True friendship gives out, 
it cannot withhold. It is democratic rejoicing to help in the 
uplift of men. Friendship greatly stimulates the appreciation 
of human values. If we shun people we shall be sure to de- 
preciate them. It may be said that men such as lawyers, 
physicians, officers of the law, and tradesmen do not confirm 
the statement that he who knows people best finds most to 
hope for in them. These callings by their very nature intro- 
duce their votaries to people under exceptional and sometimes 
disadvantageous circumstances. But it may be said that even 
among these the great majority are optimists. Making all 
allowance, they see more that is good than bad in human 
nature. We may still hold to the fine saying of somebody, 
that to know all would be to forgive all and love all. 

We are all built for friendship. To forego it is to starve the 
soul. 

To cherish it is to fill one's life with satisfaction. The pre- 
requisites of friendship are sympathy and sincerity, sympathy 
to inspire and direct us, sincerity to commend us. 

In this matter the spurious will not take us very far. Prac- 
ticing friendship is indeed an art. To affect an interest we 
do not feel is not only offensive it is futile. People have a 
keen sense for the genuine. 

Early Christianity owed no little of its popularity to the 
stimulus of friendship. Strangers came together and found 
that they were brethren. Hospitality was free and generous. 



ALLAN B. PHILPUTT 355 

The common life was exalted. The rich and the poor commin- 
gled. 

This social value cannot be overlooked in accounting for the 
success of the early church. Were it emphasized today the 
church would double its power. A cold, unsocial Church is a 
paradox. The Master said, ' ' I have called you friends. ' ' 

The intellectual powers of men are greatly heightened by 
the practice of friendship. It is deep calling unto deep. When 
one sits down to write how difficult to find a good, thought or 
felicitous expression. But when one sits down to write to a 
friend troops of gentle thoughts invest themselves on every 
hand with chosen words. Sometimes the atmosphere of home 
grows dull and heavy. The family speak to one another in 
monosyllables, if at all. A friend comes in, all tongues are 
loosened and speech is bright and gay. The world is full of 
interesting things. All surprise themselves by talking well. 

Life is full of pleasant surprises to the friendly man. People 
are better than he had supposed. He finds that goodness has 
a way of distributing itself. He will find honor among thieves, 
tender charity among the debased, and chivalry among out- 
laws. 

There are not so many thoroughly bad people. I have al- 
ways wondered why Abraham failed to find even ten righteous 
men in Sodom. He surely did not hunt very long. There 
must have been enough goodness in the city to outfit ten men. 
Sodom ought, it seems, to have been saved. 

I have known good men to fail in the exercise of the offices 
of friendship because in manner if not in speech they carry 
a sort of rebuke for those who are not up to their standard. 
This is unfortunate. Men should meet upon the level. One's 
delinquencies are sufficiently rebuked by the fact that a better 
man seems to take no notice of them. 

It was in a way an epoch in the history of the Church when 
Peter and John came down to Samaria with the sanction of the 
Mother Church to hearten the new converts. It made them 
feel that they were loved and cared for. And the apostles were 
enlarged in heart by the contact. In fact one of the problems 



356 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

of the early Church was this thing, so regnant in the Spirit 
of Jesns, to be friendly to those without the pale. The great 
need of the preacher is to know life. He cannot get it from 
books least of all from statistics. He must know at short 
range and in personal contact with it. Every preacher should 
compel himself to large pastoral obligations. Two preachers 
whom I knew, were once talking together on the public square 
of the town. They parted, one saying that he must get to his 
study and prepare for Sunday. The other said I think I will 
walk around the square and see if I cannot pick up a sermon. 
Both were right but other things being equal, the man who gets 
his sermon out of the people will preach to the largest congre- 
gation. 

I have spoken of sincerity. It is not easy to maintain it 
amid all the lure of the world. " Every man" says Emerson, 
alone is sincere. At the entrance of a second person hypoc- 
risy begins." 

Do you feel that the age is false, that plain dealing and frank 
speaking have given way to finesse and simulation? Why 
then not make it our aim to stand in true relations with others. 
We have nothing to lose and every thing to gain. True friend- 
ship is possible only on condition that we do not capitulate. 
We show respect for others when we refuse to appear in a 
false light to them. 

Sympathy too, conditions friendship, for without it there can 
be no lasting bond. Good comradeship may exist among 
equals marked by loyalty and disinterestedness, but the circle 
will be small. Sympathy leads far afield to all sorts and con- 
ditions of men. It opens doors of service in unexpected places. 
It helps us to see the good even when choked by evil. It in- 
terprets to us the minor chords of life's sadness and pathos. 
Jesus was ' ' touched with a feeling of our infirmities. ' ' 

The offices of friendship are among the sweetest of earth. 
He who fulfills them is as the shadow of a great rock in a 
weary land. The weary and heavy laden will bless him 
and upon whomsoever he lays hands they shall receive the gift 
of the Holy Spirit. 



ALLAN B. PHILPUTT 357 

Another thing not sufficiently appreciated by the majority, 
is what may be called The Spiritual Sense. 

Simon the Sorcerer with all his hearing of the word, and 
seeing of the works of Philip, quite missed the significance 
of it all. 

He lacked the spiritual sense, the power to rightly interpret. 
Only after he was crushed and humiliated did the scales fall 
from his eyes. His penitence was genuine and touching. 
The last sentence from his lips, as the incident passes is full 
of a sweet cadence: "Pray for me." So for many of us spirit- 
ual vision comes after earthly pride is broken. 

Are we cultivating the spiritual sense in our Churches? It 
is to be feared that the Church is too much at home with the 
world. 

We talk about the spirit of our age, and about keeping 
abreast of the times. In a way there is some wisdom in this 
but at best it is shallow. We import the quick and snappy 
phrases of commerce and the street into sermons. We urge 
the Church to take its cue from the methods of worldy success. 
We seem to think that all the wisdom we need to make the 
Church go can be picked up in the head office of a business 
corporation. In the long run it will be found insufficient. 
The kingdom cannot be financed by method. The ranks cannot 
be kept filled by madness. It is not the language of the street 
we need but the language of the kingdom. It is not frenzied 
denunciation that will carry conviction but the words of Him 
whose voice is as the sound and throb of many waters. 

And why trail the Church along in the wake of the world's 
swift and changing life? 

The world is not notably successful or satisfied. Modern 
business methods are no guarantee against failure, even in 
business. As a matter of fact the majority of business enter- 
prises fail. 

Does the Church sufficiently invite the confidence and hope 
of the burdened, the oppressed and the sorrowing? Are they 
not coming less and less with their confessions and difficulties ? 

The lame and the broken still lie outside the beautiful gates 



358 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

of the temple and ask alms. We have silver and gold, but can 
we heal? They do not leap and walk. Their ankle bones do 
not receive strength. 

In the eleventh chapter of Hebrews we have a long list of 
men and women celebrated for their faith, in other words 
their spiritual sense. 

They seem to have been " efficient." They confessed that 
they were strangers and pilgrims in the earth. They were 
accounted anything but "practical" by their contemporaries. 
But of all high antiquity their names alone survive. They 
walked with God. Though strangers in the earth they were 
the only ones who never lost their way. They followed the 
gleam and widened the horizons of the world. To this day 
we who have lost our way go to them to be set right. They 
had the spiritual sense. 

Christians must, of course, live in the world, but they should 
also feel at home in heavenly places. Jesus mingled with men 
and went into the ways of the multitude, but he was most at 
home on the mountain side, in the haunts of prayer, and among 
the sinful and suffering. The disciples may well imitate their 
Lord, and sense the spiritual values of life. 

The Church has too much followed the fashion of the world, 
in methods, in speech and in spirit. Indifference is every- 
where complained of. Curious and absurd cults make head- 
way. The people have itching ears for some new thing. This 
proves that the Church has, at least partially lost her message. 
There are some explanations for this. We are smothered with 
too many little enterprises clamoring for support. We exhaust 
ourselves in little forays of reform but fight no great battle. 

Instead of feeding the sheep the preacher must always be 
shearing them. 

Our songs are strident with mock heroics, and our prayers 
rap the delinquents. 

We have fallen into careless and misguided methods. 

Worship should be calm, reverent and thoughtful. The sense 
of the spiritual values are best developed by indirection and in 
an atmosphere of contemplation. 



ALLAN B. PHILPUTT 359 

We must rise to an intellectual grasp of truth. We are not 
loving God with all our minds. Our eyes are not dazzled by 
the ways of the Infinite. We are lost in! the littleness of things 
It is hard to grasp and hold the vision of God. We trust al- 
together to the emotional. All our enterprises and plans spring 
out of emotional hours, often purposely prearranged. We 
hurry them to completion ere the tide is lost. We are afraid 
of deliberation. Our specious enthusiasms melt away in hours 
of calm. A Catholic priest said, "I read the Church adver- 
tisements and see that you protestants are screaming for a big 
audience next Sunday. We Catholics are slower, we want a 
big audience in the next generation. We do not care so much 
about next Sunday. ' ' Thus speaks Rome with the wisdom of a 
thousand years. 

The spiritual sense will in time perish unless encouraged and 
fed by great ideals of which the mind can take hold. We ruin 
things by hurry. 

These which have been enumerated are some of the spirit- 
ual values of life. They seem to me most worth while. We 
all desire to get the most possible out of life. Jesus himself 
was very particular about values. He saw that most people 
were getting a bad bargain in life. He came to show them 
the true values. He asks no one to become poorer. He de- 
sires to enrich all. Alas, there are some whom the wealth he 
speaks of, will never satisfy. 



P. H. WELSHIMER 

TTEBE is a man who sees the universe exactly the size of his work- 
•*- J- shop. In other words his universe is measured by his responsibility, 
and his responsibility is measured by just the size of his opportunity. 
Within this universe to know the unknowable; to see the invisible, and 
to do the impossible, is the limit of Christian endeavor. 

P. H. Welshimer was born on a farm near York, Union County, Ohio, 
April 6, 1873. At the age of nine his parents moved to West Mansfield 
in an adjoining county where they still live. There he was reared and 
attended the public schools. He graduated at Ohio Northern University 
at Ada in 1894 and from Hiram College in 1897. Spent five years in his 
first pastorate at Millersburg, Ohio. January 1, 1902, he took the pas- 
torate at Canton, Ohio, where he still resides. The church at Canton 
in this time has grown from a membership of less than four hundred to a 
resident membership of 3,400 with a non-resident of seven hundred. The 
Bible school has grown from less than two hundred to be the largest 
in the world. The enrollment in the attending school is above 5,000. 
Cradle Boll and Home Department bring the total enrollment to nearly 
6,000. May 15, 1900, he was married to Miss Clara Hornig, of Vermilion, 
Ohio. They have three children — Helen, Mildred and Balph, whose ages 
are 16, 14 and 10. 

Mr. Welshimer possesses a winning personality, though he is shy of 
using it for popular ends. He impresses one with the idea that he holds 
within himself an immense amount of reserve force. While his achieve- 
ments for any day are great, he makes one feel that ne plus ultra has 
no place in his outlook. His tomorrow is always bigger than his today. 

What are the chief elements of his phenomenal success? 

(1) An overmastering faith. He believes something and this some- 
thing is definite. He does not attempt all things that by all means he 
may do nothing. He plans his work, and this is wisely done. 

(2) But he knows the plan is nothing, if it is not vitalized by per- 
sonality. 

(3) He is himself the battery which energizes every part of the ma- 
chinery. Without Welshimer the work at Canton would cease to be a 
wonder. But this is the fate of all great personalities. Spurgeon was 
a great personality, and also a great organizer, but since his death his 
work has dwindled. A steam engine! is worthless without the steam. An 
army may be a power for weakness if it has not a competent and inspir- 
ing leader. Napoleon was more than all his men. Welshimer is more 

361 



362 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

than all his organizations, and yet without these organizations, he 
could not do the great work he is doing. His) great success is owing 
to personality wisely adjusted to well considered plans for work. 

What he can do, cannot others do? We answer, No. Eight here is 
the danger of what is called method. David could not wear Saul's armor, 
but he could do even a greater work than Saul could do. Everyone 
must plan and work out his or her own methods. Schools for Methods 
and lectures on Methods, may do much harm, if not wisely qualified. 
Mr. Welshimer's church and school would be a white\ elephant in the 
hands of some men of even more talent than he has, but of an entirely 
different kind. Every man has his place, but Welshimer's place is not 
for every man. 





-pn<jU^<^u^ 



A SERMON TO THE MORAL MAN 

By P. H. "Welshimer 

Text.— Acts 10:5, 6 and 33. 

"WOULD like to have an audience like that once, where it 
■*■ might be said that everyone present was there to hear, not 
the things that might be pleasing to them but to hear 
the things that are commanded of the Lord to be preached 
unto the people. I don't wonder that Peter preached a great 
sermon. I don't marvel that there was a very fine obedience 
to that sermon, when I take into consideration the character 
of the audience he had before him. It is always a pleasure for 
a preacher to preach to an audience that desires to hear; an 
audience of seekers after truth, people that are willing to fol- 
low the light as given unto them. I am going to talk about 
this moral man who sent for a preacher, who heard a sermon 
and who obeyed the Gospel, accepting the preaching of that 
preacher. I realize, and I think you do, that a great deal is 
said in this age, and I presume could be said in any age con- 
cerning the moral man. We are all agreed that we would much 
rather have a community of fine moral men than a community 
of men that are immoral; no question about that. But some 
of us are agreed that we would rather have a community of 
men that are fine Christian men than to have one of simply 
moral men. I want to show you by the Gospel that there is a 
vast difference between the Christian man and the moral man. 
There is an idea prevalent in this world that when a man is 
moral that is all that is required of him. We sometimes hear 
such declarations made by ministers of the Gospel, who ought 
to know better. I heard a minister in a ministerial gathering 
one time talking about men whom he called Christian moral men 
outside of the church. I might as well talk about that fine 
Mason who stands outside the Masonic lodge, or that fine mar- 

363 



364 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

ried man who never was married, or that fine citizen of the 
United States who was born and reared and died over in 
England and never saw the United States. As much sense 
in one as the other. But because some men have talked this, 
and because men have laid aside as of no importance the or- 
dinances and commands of our Lord, a great many people 
have taken considerable satisfaction in and have congratulated 
themselves upon the fact that they are moral and hence be- 
cause moral they are Christians and that all that is required 
of them is just to live a moral life. You will see many men, 
as you go out to do personal work, who will talk something 
like this: "I will just invite you to go around to the stores 
and see how my accounts are; I believe the merchants will tell 
you I pay my bills as promptly as any Christian man. I pick 
out a good man when I vote, just as well as the Christian man. 
I walk uprightly and thus am a good citizen; thus, to make a 
long story short I am a good, all-around fellow and nobody 
finds fault with me, consequently because I am living a good 
life I am all right; therefore I can't see why I am not as good 
as the man in the church, and if I am as good as the man in 
the church where is my sin?" A lot of preachers would take 
that fellow by the hand and say, " Bless you, keep on." That 
would be all right if God Almighty did not state something 
else, but that makes it all wrong. It is all right for me to 
talk about my wishes and give a lot of opinions about what 
kind of a fellow I ought! to be to be a Mason or what I ought to 
do to get into the Masonic Lodge, provided there is no law 
adopted by the Masonic body which tells me what I have to 
do to get into that lodge and what I have to do when I get in. 
But when I put my opinions beside the teaching of that Ma- 
sonic Lodge and they don't correspond you will find I can't 
get in. To get in I would have to agree to their teaching. 
Christ has given his law for men. God went to the trouble 
of sending his Only Begotten Son down to this world to be 
the Great Law-Giver. He has given a plain, Gospel state- 
ment and he has said to the whole round world, "This is my 
law; do certain things and you will be a Christian; you will 



P. H. WELSHIMER 365 

be in Christ. You will be a Son of God; you will be an heir 
of his and a joint heir with Jesus Christ." If this teaching re- 
garding the moral man, which you find very prevalent in the 
world, if this teaching be true, then the Gospel is null and 
void. If this teaching be true then we have no need of the 
church as a divine institution. Its place in the world can be 
filled by any lodge or any order. In place of the Christ all 
you need is some great moral teacher who can teach folk. You 
don't need a man to die for the world; you don't need sins 
forgiven. I can't believe that God sent his Only Begotten Son 
down to this world just for a joke or that he came to this 
world to mislead the people or came with a message that the 
world doesn't need. God never does useless things. When 
he gave atmosphere and mixed it with certain elements, he 
did it because the world needs it. When he gave sunlight 
he gave it because the world needs it. When he gave certain 
kinds of food in certain parts of the world he gave it because 
they need that kind there. God never does things wrong. 
God gives us just what we require, and I have faith in God, and 
in Christ and I don't believe there is one superfluous command 
in the Book. Man needs to do everything and only the things 
which God has commanded us to do. Therefore, I say as 
Paul, "I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Chris-t for it is the 
power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth it." 
I believe with Jesus Christ, "Nicodemus, ye must be born 
again." He was far better than many of the moral men you 
see on the streets of any city. Nicodemus was a teacher and 
student of the law. He believed in the righteousness that was 
prevalent in the world in his day, but that did not suffice, 
and hence when Nicodemus came to the young Teacher he 
said, "You must be born of the water and of the Spirit." 
I believe that Christ knew what he was talking about. 
He had the Father's message. Standing on the mountain 
yonder he looked down into the faces of his disciples and 
said, "Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel to every 
creature; he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; 
he that believeth not shall be condemned." Those are the last 



366 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

words spoken by the Son of God before be took bis flight to 
glory. I believe he meant what he said and he said what he 
meant. This being true, therefore let us just for a little while 
see one of these messengers of our Lord as he goes out and 
preaches the message to a certain man, who might be called 
a moral man, and yet this man was far above the average man 
who today is called moral. Many people on the earth would 
call him a Christian man, but you will find according to the 
teaching of the book he was not that. I see on the day of 
Pentecost an agent of our Lord into whose hands the Gospel 
message had been delivered, stand before a multitude of people 
and preach the "Word, and when he had finished the sermon 
there were some people who stood and cried out with one 
voice, "Men and brethren what shall we do?" There were 
more people who did it than people in this house right now. 
They had heard a man speak as he was moved by the Holy 
Spirit. Now we go on for a few years and come to the lesson 
to which I referred. We see this same man speaking for the 
first time to a Gentile, for this man was a Jew, this preacher, 
talking to a Gentile down in the town of Caesarea, and when 
I tell you of the character of the Gentile, no doubt someone 
will say it looks like foolishness for a man to go so far away 
and attempt to preach to a good fellow like that. Look at the 
character of this Gentile or this moral man. I read in Acts 
tenth chapter that this man was engaged in prayer at 3 o 'clock 
in the afternoon, he was a believer in Almighty God. He was 
a centurion, he had charge of a hundred men, the Italian 
band, a very honorable, responsible position. This man was 
possibly away from home down here at Caesarea with these 
men keeping peace among all people, down here he lived a 
life that was worth while. He let his light shine and his influ- 
ence count for God, and while he was praying an angel came 
down from heaven. The angel saw this man in prayer, he 
came and touched him and said, "Cornelius, thy prayers and 
thine alms-giving have come up as a memorial before God." 
Do you ever offer a prayer and wonder whether the Lord hears 
it ; whether the Lord would answer it ? Here was a man pray- 



P. H. WELSHIMER 367 

ing and the angel said, "Cornelius, you are all right, the Lord 
has taken notice of what you say and what you do. Now you 
send down to Joppa and you inquire for a man by the name of 
Simon, whose surname is Peter. You will find him in the 
house of Simon, a tanner." God always makes his messages 
plain, never ambiguous. Read the second and third verses of 
the 10th chapter of Acts, then read the closing part — the 
thirty-second and thirty-third verses and you learn several 
things about the character of this man who was devout. He 
did not make sport of religion, he did not talk against the 
Jews. He had reverence, he respected everybody that had 
faith and walked according to that faith. He feared God 
with all his house. This man had such reverence and such 
faith in God that his wife and his children and all his servants 
and attendants led a devout life because of his devout life. I 
read also that he gave much alms to the people. If he had not 
been a generous fellow it would have just said he gave 
alms to the people. If a man sees a beggar out in the street 
and gives him a nickel you can say he gave alms, but this man 
gave much. He looked towards God and worshiped him; he 
looked towards his fellow-men and helped them. He prayed 
to God. When these fellows came down and told Peter to 
preach to this man they said, "He is of good report among 
all the nations of the Jews." "Peter, you go over to Rome, 
you go up to Jerusalem, you go to Antioch, you go to Ephesus, 
you go anywhere, everywhere and wherever there is a Jew 
that knows this Gentile Cornelius by name he will never say a 
word against him. " It is pretty hard to find a good moral man 
today about whom some folks will not talk. Somebody will 
say something. Here was a man of good report. The Jews 
hadn't much use for a Gentile, yet all the folks spoke well of 
him. They said, "He is a man that believes in God with all 
his house ; he is a man who prays ; he is a man who gives alms 
unto the people ; he is a man who is devout ; he is a man about 
whom people everywhere speak well; he is a man whom God 
has taken note of, so much so that he has sent an angel down 
to tell him to send for a preacher to preach to him." I fancy 



368 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

I know some people who, if they knew that God listened to 
their prayers, knew that everybody spoke well of them, if an 
angel would come down to them; if they had a message that 
their prayers were heard in heaven and the Lord in heaven had 
seen them make their gifts and he praised them for it would 
say, "Now, sir, will you take me in the church? I am a good 
moral man, will you take me in ? " I would not, but I think I 
know some that would. I would not because Peter did not 
take this man in until this man had done something else. He 
first had to hear, some things he had to learn and when he 
learned he had to render obedience, and when this man obeyed 
Christ he loved Christ as he before had loved God and when 
he loved Christ and God and obeyed them he became a Chris- 
tian. ' ' You send down to Joppa for one Simon, whose surname 
is Peter; go down by the seaside and there is a house down 
there which belongs to another Simon, a tanner; this preacher 
lives there; you go down there and get him and bring him 
back and he will tickle your ears." It doesn't read like that. 
' ' He will confirm your faith and tell you you are all right. ' ' No, 
it is not like that. "He will tell you what you ought to do." 
That is what it says. Cornelius did not debate. He did not 
say, "I am good enough." He did not have any thinks about 
it; he desired to do what God wanted him to do, so this cen- 
turion called in two servants and a trusted soldier. He was a 
devout soldier; he did not call a scoffer, he believed in God, 
and he said to the soldier and the two servants, ' ' You go down 
to Joppa and bring a preacher by the name of Peter." And 
then he told these men what the angel had said. They start 
down to Joppa, arriving the next day about the noon hour. 
The tops of the houses were made so that people could rest up 
there. Peter was on the house-top. He went up there to pray 
and while praying he became very hungry, but while waiting for 
the dinner below he fell into a trance, and while in that trance he 
saw things. He saw a great vessel let down from heaven and 
in that vessel he saw all manner of four-footed beasts, fouls of 
the earth, creeping things, and a voice said, "Rise, Peter, kill 
and eat." He said, "Not so, Lord, I have never eaten any- 



P. H. WELSHIMER 369 

thing common or unclean." And the voice said the second 
time, "Bise, Peter, kill and eat." Three times came the same 
answer. Then the voice said, "What I have cleansed call not 
common or unclean." Then Peter awoke and wondered what 
it all meant. While thinking about it three men out in the 
street inquired about the house of Simon. They rattled at the 
gate and they said, "Is this where Simon, the tanner lives?" 
They said, "It is." The men said, "Is Peter here?" Then 
they told Simon Peter that three men were waiting for him. 
And while this was going on the Holy Spirit came to Peter 
and said, "Behold three men wait for thee; rise and go with 
them, doubting nothing." And then Peter began to under- 
stand what it all meant. He went down, introduced himself 
to them and after resting all night they go down to Caesarea. 
Over here this man Cornelius knows just how long it will take 
these men to get back home. So this devout man, this man 
who wanted to know what he had to do, went out over the 
city and did what I wish everybody would do — told his friends 
about it and said, "About this time tomorrow I want you to 
come to my house ; I have sent for a preacher, we are going 
to hold a meeting over there, and this man will tell me what 
I have to do ; I want you to come. ' ' And so the next day into 
the city of Caesarea came ten men. Here are the two servants 
and the soldier sent by Cornelius, here are the six Jews sent 
as witnesses, and Peter; and about this time the neighbors 
begin to gather, his kinsmen assemble, his house is full and 
when he saw the ten men coming he went to meet them. As 
a courteous and refined gentleman he threw himself at the 
feet of Peter, and Peter reached down and took him by the 
shoulder and lifted him up and said, "Stand up; worship God; 
don 't worship me. ' ' I wish everybody would do that. And so 
Peter and Cornelius walked along together and Peter said, "I 
have learned something, sir, I know that the Gospel is not 
only for the one class, the Jews, but I know now that God is 
no respector of persons, the Gospel is for both Jew and Gen- 
tile; it is for all." So they talked along and Cornelius told 
why he had sent for him, about what he had been praying, and 



370 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

then took him in and introduced him and said, "Behold we 
are all here." There were no idle fellows in this crowd, no- 
body here just to take notes; nobody trying to spy out the 
land, but we are all here. "What for? "To hear all things 
commanded thee of God. Now speak on." What an audi- 
ence, what a preacher, what a message. Peter began and 
told the simple story. A simple, beautiful, convincing story of 
the Great Man. He told of the Christ, read this in the 33d and 
34th verses of the tenth chapter, of the Christ who came to 
earth to save men. He told of Christ going about doing good, 
of his crucifixion on the Mount of Calvary, of his death, of his 
burial and resurrection, of his ascension back to the Father; 
and the Holy Spirit came upon them. These men were wit- 
nesses of what had been done. And when he had come to this 
point there was great excitement around there, nothing like it 
had ever been in this world except once before. I would like 
to have a meeting break up something like that. That was 
one place where the whole audience came to Christ. While 
Peter was preaching the Lord was keeping his eye on the 
whole affair and he poured out the Holy Spirit on the audi- 
ence; not on the preacher, but on the audience; and every fel- 
low in that audience began to talk in a different tongue. And 
the Jews that listened to that sermon could not understand 
this, and they marvelled, they were surprised. The preacher 
knew what it all meant. That thing happened just once be- 
fore, on the day of Pentecost, when another great audience 
was gathered together. The Holy Spirit came to them and 
they talked in different tongues. That time it was done that 
the audience might believe that these men were sent of God. 
This time these six Jews saw the working of the Spirit in a 
miraculous way on the audience and were led to believe that 
the Gospel was for all people. This is the way the statement 
that they were to go into all the world and preach the 
Gospel to every creature, was confirmed. The preacher under- 
stood why the Spirit had been poured out on these people that 
they talked in different tongues. He did not say, "Cornelius, 
you are a good man, you give alms, the Lord has poured out 



P. H. WELSHIMER 371 

his Spirit on you ; come and walk with us. ' ' But he said, ' ' Can 
any man forbid water that these should not be baptized, see- 
ing they have received the Holy Spirit as well as we!" The 
Book tells us that he took Cornelius and those who heard and 
baptized them. If a moral man can be saved without giving 
heed unto the Word of God; if a moral man can be saved with- 
out obeying the ordinances of God, then a great blunder has 
been made right here in this Book and Peter was out of place 
and did the wrong thing. Will you listen to the inspired apos- 
tle, back of whom was an angel, back of whom was the Holy 
Spirit, back of whom was God? Will you listen to that or 
will you listen to some man who says ' ' It is all right if you are 
satisfied ? ' ' Are you as good as Cornelius was ? I think I know 
some men who are moral, who do not pray, they do not give 
alms, they are not serving God with their whole house. If you 
can measure up to him, if he had to do these things in order to 
be right, where are you ? Are you willing to stand where you 
are or will you arise like a man and say, "I am in earnest, I 
am so interested that I will do these certain things?" A man 
may say, "I feel that I am all right;" may be you do, but feel- 
ings do not save men. It is not a question of how you feel but 
how does God feel? Not, are you satisfied, but is the Lord 
satisfied? When you have met him where he has promised to 
meet you then he is satisfied. When you have done what he 
has told you to do, then he will do what he has promised to 
do. This is the only safe way. Cornelius now became a child 
of God. His sins were forgiven. He was wedded to Christ. 
He was not under condemnation for he was in Christ. He was 
born again. Do what Cornelius did — and will you doubt your 
having done the right thing? Be more than moral — be in 
Christ — and Christ will make you free. 



HARRY D. SMITH 

WE have here to deal with a big little man. Napoleon was small 
of stature, but he had a giant intellect. Alexander Stevens was a 
very little man, and yet he was big enough to be vice-president of the 
Southern Confederacy. Even the apostle Paul was small in stature, if 
his name is significant (and this is probable), but the world has not 
known his intellectual superior among men. 

Mr. Smith is neither physically large, nor strong, but when he begins to 
speak one soon forgets he is little in stature, so entirely does he dominate 
by his massive thoughts and his intense earnestness. 

The following facts with regard to his life and work are sufficient 
to show how steadily he has grown in power and influence until today 
he is one of the most popular ministers among the Disciples of Christ. 

Born, January 22, 1866, at Hamilton, Caldwell County, Missouri. 

Father, Philander Smith, farmer, later merchant in Hamilton and 
Kansas City. Elder in the Hamilton church, generous in hospitality, 
time and money in support of the church. 

Mother, Sarah A. Smith, thoughtful, conscientious, faithful wise, wish- 
ing strongly the best for her two sons and one daughter. A notable friend 
of the church at Hamilton. 

In public school in Missouri and Kansas from seven to thirteen years 
of age. Studied pharmacy from thirteen to sixteen years of age, becom- 
ing prescription clerk in Kansas City at sixteen. Also at about this time 
a short experience in a department store large for Kansas City at that 
time. 

Two years in Kansas City High School — summers and Saturdays in 
father's business in Kansas City — collector and bookkeeper. Before end 
of nineteenth year entered Missouri State University at Columbia. 

Before end of first college year went with Chas. A. Young, then a 
student preacher, to one of his preaching places. He persuaded young 
Smith to talk to his congregation at night. This was his first attempt 
to j)reach. Had too many heads in the sermon and so lost the head which 
is the one indispensable head required for preaching. 

Had united with the church at sixteen years of age. Thos. P. Haley 
baptized him. Belonged to Locust Street church where Mr. Haley 
preached until close of his school days at the age of twenty-one. Heard 
Procter, Longan,.Plattenburg and Mount joy in these years and later. They 
impressed him deeply. At Columbia Mountjoy was his minister and 
friend as Thos. P. Haley was at Kansas City. 

373 



374 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Encouraged by these men and other friends he participated in prayer 
meetings, Bible schools and preaching services- 

During the college vacation of his twenty-first year began to preach 
more or less regularly at Olathe, Kansas, and other points. Continued 
to preach at Olathe during the next college year and during three years 
next following graduation. Was graduated from University of Kansas 
in June, 1887. Degree of A.B. Later received degree of A.M. from 
Transylvania College, then Kentucky University. New church house 
built at Olathe during ministry there. Held many evangelistic meetings 
during years at Olathe. 

Became minister of Summit Street (now West Side Church) at Kan- 
sas City in 1890. Married to Miss Lucy M. Christy, of Olathe, in the 
same year. On account of depleted health went to Eureka Springs, Ark., 
in 1891. Became minister of church there later in that year, continuing 
there until October, 1893. 

October, 1893, to October, 1895, minister at Marshall, Mo. October, 
1895, to June, 1896, secretary of Foreign Missions for Missouri. Septem- 
ber, 1896, to November, 1914, minister at Hopkinsville, Ky. President of 
Kentucky Christian Missionary Convention in 1909 (Centennial Con- 
vention). 

President American Christian Missionary Society in 1911. Member 
of several missionary boards, college boards, etc., for years. 

Member of faculty of McLean College for fifteen years, teaching 
Christian evidence, logic, ethics and courses in the Bible. Occasional 
lecturer at other colleges. 

Thirty-five thousand dollars expended on church property and $42,000 
given to missions, charity and education by church at Hopkinsville dur- 
ing ministry there. During the same ministry church there grew from 
325 members to 1,000. 

November, 1914, at Central Christian church, Dallas, Texas. Church 
property there enlarged and modernized, with special reference to the 
Bible school, at a cost of $16,000. Plans were made for such changes 
of organization as are indicated by the downtown situation of the 
church. 

Health being somewhat impaired, resigned pastorate at Dallas, in 1917 
and accepted a call to professorship in Phillips University, Enid, Okla- 
homa. 

Harry D. Smith is another illustration of the value of long pastorates. 
His work at Hopkinsville was almost a phenomenal success. His 18 
years' pastorate there did much in preparing him for the pastorate of 
of great church at Dallas, and for the education of young men for the 
ministry in the college where he now labors. 

It is a significant fact that more than half of the preachers, repre- 
sented in this volume, have held somewhat long pastorates. What this 
fact means can be read between the lines, and it ought to be a lesson 
to peripatetic pastors. 




r>m 






REST 

By Harry D. Smith 

Text — "And I will give you rest." — Matt. 11:18. 

TT is a weary world. It has always been weary. Its weari- 
■*■ ness is and has been deep and quite universal. They who 
work, not only, but they who play, also, are weary and have 
been so since history began. They who are weighted with 
disease, and they who are in the vigor of health alike, have 
been and are weary. No class could in the past, neither can 
it now, be exempt from weariness. Burns at his plow, and 
Solomon on his throne, have voiced the fact and all we who 
have no clear voice of song or speech such as they had, endur- 
ing voicelessly, know the fact. 

And Jesus promises rest — upon conditions, it is true — but 
still he promises rest! The promise is very sweet. It has 
ravished many hearts. Can he keep his promise? Can he 
give what wealth, pleasure, power, philosophy and art have 
failed to give? 

His first appearance is much against His promise. He is a 
toiler with His hands. Such is the unvarying tradition, and 
such is the practical certainty. He is a tireless toiler as teacher, 
physician, and friend. The most massive mind and the tough- 
est body known to history must have been taxed to their ut- 
most — perhaps overwhelmed — by any one of several of His 
days, so filled were these days with toil. Besides the prophet 
looking forward to Him called Him "a man of sorrows and 
acquainted with grief. ' ' He said of Him also, ' ' Surely He 
hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows and the Lord 
hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all." And again the 
prophet foretells that He should be " taken from prison and 
from judgment," and that "His soul" should be made "an 
offering for sin. ' ' And from Gethsemane arises a cry of anguish, 

375 



376 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

and from the way to the cross the sound of a body falling 
under its burden upon the pavement, and from the cross 
comes over seas and centuries a wail of woe that is penetrating 
to every human ear. How impossible on the face of the matter 
is any reasonable hope of rest at the hands of one so awfully 
burdened ! 

But there is something convincing in the voice of Jesus in 
this promise and so we are led to go down more deeply into 
His life and work to see if anywhere we can find justification 
for it. Perhaps this toiler's, this anguished sufferer's promise 
of rest has its origin in some deep and innermost center of ex- 
perience — some core of calm and refreshment in His life of 
burden and storm. And it may be that He has done such 
things for mankind as tend to make this promise reasonable. 
Perhaps, for example, He has given rest of body to classes of 
creatures long overburdened. 

We shall have gone down only a little way in the experience 
of Jesus as it is exhibited on the pages of the New Testament 
before we shall find clear intimations of the central calm which 
we have conjectured. Thus He says to His disciples in the 
shadow of the cross, "My peace I give unto you," and again 
He says to them in the same awful shadow ' ' These things have 
I spoken unto you that in me ye may have peace. ' ' Let us go 
on down into the life of this toiler — this sufferer, and we 
shall hear Him saying, still in the shadow of the cross, "In 
the world ye shall have tribulations, but be of good cheer I 
have overcome the world. ' ' And if we go down to yet another 
level of this soundless life we shall hear a quiet voice saying, 
"The hour cometh, yea, is come, that ye shall be scattered 
every man to his own and shall leave me alone; and yet I am 
not alone because the Father is with me." Even Grethsemane 
and the cross cannot hide — nay, they display — the restful cen- 
ter of the life of Jesus. In the former through a veil of tears 
and blood we see the angels ministering to Him while He 
concludes agonizing prayers in perfect submission to the will 
of the Father. From the latter the voice of the sufferer still 
says "Father" and at last "My Father," thus declaring His 



HARRY D. SMITH 377 

sense of His kinship with the very source of all. Even in the 
awful heart-breaking cry, "My God, my God, why hast thou 
forsaken me?" it is not hard to detect the hope which is ever 
under the despair of the good — and there is rest in hope. But 
of all the utterances of Jesus which show the heart of peace 
which beats behind the toil and tragedy with which he clothed 
His spirit for a time, none is more impressive than His allusion 
to Himself as "The Son of man who is in Heaven." Here on 
earth — still "in Heaven!" His soul "exceeding sorrowful 
even unto death" still possessed of the shoreless, fathomless 
peace of oneness with God ! So Jesus does not mock us by 
offering to us what he does not possess. He himself had the 
rest which he offered to others. 

Now as to our second conjecture. Has Jesus given bodily 
rest to long overburdened creatures? The answer of his per- 
sonal ministry is manifold, impressive. He was always lifting 
loads from bodies. The fainting he refreshed with food for 
which they had not worked, and so he lifted one day a load of 
labor from thousands of bodies. The barren night toil of his 
fishermen friends he more than once made suddenly and un- 
wontedly fruitful with a word, and thus saved them from 
the weariness of added labor. He lifted disease from bodies 
with the same ease and even greater frequency. He "re- 
buked" a fever and it left its victim. He bade the paralytic 
"rise take up" his "bed and walk," and was obeyed. He 
stopped a hemorrhage of years. He made the leprous sound 
and wholesome. And three times at fewest he lifted from 
human bodies the appalling weight of death. 

The answer of His ministry since His ascension is not less 
but more manifold and impressive. The principles of His 
Gospel through the influence of His church have been more 
widely beneficial to weary bodies than was the Lord Him- 
self in His personal ministry. Through His people and their 
friends he feeds millions as once he fed thousands of the 
dependent. By the social order, the self-respect, the spirit 
of self-help, and the ambition to produce wealth in order to 
be more useful, to which the Gospel leads, the toil of man- 



378 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

kind is being- made fruitful in such degree and kind as almost 
to belittle the astounding miracles which Jesus wrought in 
filling the nets of his friends of Galilee. He has taken from 
the women in many lands the oppressive weight of inappro- 
priate physical labor. He has withdrawn the children of 
many lands from premature employment in their industries. 
He has continued to lift the load of disease. In Christian 
hospital and dispensary, and by the hands of missionary phy- 
sicians and surgeons and nurses, he is banishing disease as of 
old he did with his word. Only now he does this for millions 
and not for a few. His influence through his people in the 
laws of civilized lands is even careful to take the burden 
from the back of the overworked or diseased beast — a remi- 
niscence of his manger-cradle. 

And so it seems credible that Jesus can give rest. He has 
the secret of it in his own experience and he has given rest to 
many tired and exhausted bodies of both men and women 
and children and lower animals. He who can lift the weight 
of death from the human frame — what cannot be expected of 
him? Perhaps he can even share with others that rest of 
spirit which nothing can destroy — not even Gethsemanes and 
Calvaries, For after all this rest of the spirit is the real rest. 
Any other rest is superficial and evanescent. And this is the 
rest of the promise which we are considering. "Rest unto 
your souls." Such is the phrase of the promise. 

But why, you inquire, say "perhaps" about a fact estab- 
lished by the testimony of millions of the noblest persons of 
many generations? Only, of course, because in our thinking 
now nothing is intended to be asked of the merely Christian 
consciousness but all is to be derived from the common knowl- 
edge of our race. We wish, if we can, to ground ourselves 
in a character of reasoning which shall be as valid in a mosque 
as in a cathedral, in a Shinto shrine as in a mission chapel. 
Therefore we put aside Stephen dying at the hands of mur- 
derous sectaries yet with a light of heaven on his face. We 
therefore will not hear Paul — Paul the ambitious — saying, 
"I have learned in whatsoever state I am therein to be con- 



HARRY D. SMITH 379 

tent." We decline to note the voice of ambitious Augustine 
saying, "See, Lord, I cast my care upon thee." Nor will we 
hear Savonarola as he prays quietly on the day of his mar- 
tyrdom "Lord I know that thou art the eternal word; 

I know that thou didst shed thy blood for our sins. I 

pray thee that by that blood I may have remission for my 
sins;" nor will we see him as he mounts the scaffold of death 
composed, calm, absorbed, a sacrifice upon the altar of civic 
righteousness and political liberty. We turn away from the 
voice of Huss as he goes to the stake at Constance saying, ' ' In 
the faith of that Gospel which I have lived, preached and 
taught, I now joyfully die." We try to forget the countless 
less known but not less credible souls who, as a result of 
faith in Jesus, testify that they have been as channels of the 
"peace like a river." It is well-nigh impossible to shut out of 
our thinking now these witnesses to the power, not only, but 
the practice of Jesus as a giver of rest to the soul of man. 
But let us do our best to do so that anyone here who does 
not know our Lord may see if it be not true that it is not 
necessary to depend for evidence of this power upon the 
statements of others as to their own psychological conditions. 

A very simple method is open to us of thus avoiding appeal 
to the inner experience of Christians. We may inquire 
whether or not the Gospel is intrinsically suited to give rest 
of soul to one who believes it. 

What then, as far as we can now know, is the source or what 
are the sources, as the case may be, of the unrest of the human 
spirit ? 

Instantly a phrase which has become a proverb presents 
itself^ I mean the phrase "intellectual unrest." It has 
sometimes been supposed, I believe, that such unrest is more or 
less peculiar to our own time. But that is not true except in 
respect of certain phases of such unrest. Men have always 
and everywhere felt precisely in proportion to the vigor and 
acuteness of their thinking that they knew little and that 
little very partially, and their souls in like proportion have 
beaten themselves into exhaustion or madness against the bars 



380 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

of the narrow cell of their knowledge. No relief has come 
from widening knowledge. The reason is plain. It is that 
each solution is only a fresh question or, as often happens, 
many questions. Our case in respect of knowledge is the 
same in one particular, at least, as it is in respect of light. 
In the twilight which forms the edge of the tiny circle of a 
hand lantern's shining is room for only a few indistinct ob- 
jects, while in that twilight which makes the edge of the vast 
circle lighted by the high power electric lamp is room for a 
multitude of such objects. That is, widening light raises more 
questions, whether it be light of lamps or light of knowledge. 

But intellectual unrest is not alone the fruit of the fact 
that the questioning involved in the pursuit of knowledge is 
endless. It grows also out of the essential nature of certain 
capital questions which the human mind is ever asking. Thus 
questions of God, duty, and the future may not be mentioned 
in the notable treatise of the hour. Both the writer of 
such a treatise and its readers of this hour may repel — 
nay, they may sternly seek to exclude — such questions 
from their consideration. But it is quite useless. These are 
not enemies from without. They lurk, however forgotten for 
the moment, in the mind of every man. They will be con- 
sidered. They declare themselves, as it were, akin to any 
other question whatsoever and as therefore germane to every 
discussion. And so at the end of the hour they are apt to be 
found in the very forefront of reasonings which some had 
imagined were wholly removed from their vicinity. 

But most disquieting is a dissonance which always ap- 
pears to the thinker upon these supreme questions. This 
dissonance the theologian calls sin. However, it is not now of 
consequence what we may call it. It exists and seems to the 
thoughtful man the very root of misery, the very heart of 
woe. It is always to be reckoned with by the thinker without 
regard to his religion or to his lack of religion. 

Now how, if at all, does the gospel of Jesus meet this un- 
rest of the mind? Certainly not by explicit answers to all our 
questions. Such explicit answers, had they been given, would 



HARRY D. SMITH 381 

no doubt long since have called for yet other explicit answers. 
And so far from trying to explain how evil or discord can be 
in a world fashioned by a good and perfect God, Jesus exhibits 
such evil or discord as the occasion and the explanation, in 
part, of his own coming into that world. He does not use the 
method of philosophy or science, though on that account we 
must not think that what he says is either unscientific or 
unphilosophical. "The world by wisdom knew not God." 
The final object, doubtless, whether men are conscious of the 
fact or not of all search of the human kind. The methods of 
human wisdom being discredited, he uses another and a dif- 
ferent method. 

This method is very bold. It is astounding indeed. He 
puts himself in the place of truth. He says, "I am the 
truth." To the deepmost questionings of the mind he is the 
true answer, he says, and he is to be accepted by faith. The 
mind that is wretched with baffled desire to know truth is 
invited to find peace by trusting him. He exhibits himself 
as his own best credential. He declares that he is the light 
of the world, the bread from heaven, and that he gives the 
water of life. No argument is necessary to prove to the eye 
that light is light nor to the human system that bread and 
water are what they are. Thus Jesus exhibits himself to the 
mind. He does not argue much in support of doctrines. He 
does not appeal to authority. He himself is the center of au- 
thority and he himself, and not a system of doctrines, is to 
be received and trusted. So Paul could write, I know whom 
I have believed. 

Jesus says, I will give you rest. You shall find rest not in 
a literature, a science, a philosophy — not even in a philosophy 
of religion otherwise called a theology — but in him. He 
invites us to take an attitude similar to that of a little child 
who neither understands his father's business nor his father 
but nevertheless knows him sufficiently to trust him and to 
be happy in doing so. I say, he invites us, who understand 
neither the world about us nor God nor his own gracious self, 
still, out of such knowledge as we have of him, to trust him. 



382 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

Is there any other hope of such rest of mind as we seek? I 
do not know of it. It seems "We have bnt faith, we cannot 
know." And this hope is raised higher in us by particular 
expressions of Jesus as to his authority. We crave to know, 
not merely to guess, however shrewdly; not even to see what 
we wish to see about God and our relations to him as highly 
probable. How perfectly the untremulous voice of Jesus meets 
this craving! Is there a God? Jesus assumes that there is. 
Not a fleck of doubt is in all the mighty day of his certitude 
on this point. How does God regard man? Jesus answers, 
"God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son 
that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have 
everlasting life." Is there anything for us after death? Jesus 
answers, "I am the resurrection and the life, he that be- 
lieveth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live; and 
he that liveth and believeth in me shall never die." By what 
authority does he say such things? He answers that he had 
been with the Father from the beginning and had shared his 
glory before the creation of the world; that the Father sent 
him into the world and that in all that he said and did he 
varied not a hair from his commission; that he and the 
Father were really one; and that therefore all authority in 
heaven and on earth had been reposed in him. Since we can- 
not know and have but faith, — can we dream of a fitter 
object of faith than he thus appears? Is he not precisely 
such a center of rest as the mind must have if it is ever to 
rest at all? Is not faith in him the one and only conceivable 
solution of our ultimate problems of the intellect? Browning 
writes boldly, 

' ' The acknowledgment of God in Christ, 
Accepted by the reason, solves 
For thee all problems in the earth 
And out of it, and so far has 
Advanced thee to be wise." 

Who will chide his boldness? 

A second source of unrest is in the affections of mankind. 
In whom is there a quiet heart? Who can say with the 



HARRY D. SMITH 383 

psalmist, "My heart is fixed?" There is much truth in a 
simple song of our time where it says, "The world is dying 
for a little bit of love." Human love, much as we owe to it, 
is constantly failing many who trust it. Even when it is most 
steadfast and most full there is a longing in the object of it 
to be loved more intelligently. Besides, death puts a period to 
the service of human love. And worst of all we cannot be as 
sure as we could wish of our own affections. We often lose 
the affections of others, or at least the advantage of such affec- 
tions, through the cooling of our own. Can Jesus give our 
hearts the rest they cry for? 

It is certain that Jesus loved with such a love as no other 
person of history has shown to us. He loved his immediate 
disciples tenderly, and as one of them wrote, "unto the end." 
He loved the rich young ruler who was so enamored of wealth 
that he failed to profit by his love. He loved Lazarus, the 
friend whose guest he often was when he was in the vicinity 
of Jerusalem. He was tenderly considerate of his mother — 
even while he bore the pangs of the cross. He was most 
gracious to children and made by his example a new world 
for them — a world which should have them in its midst. But 
you say, these were all more or less lovely. What of the mul- 
tituds of the unlovely who by reason of being unlovely have 
most need to be loved? How good it is to be able to say that 
he loved them also. The outcasts of poverty, vice, disease, 
race, religion — he loved them all. And his enemies — what 
of them ? He loved them also and prayed for them! even while 
they crucified him. He loved the world. He gave his life 
for it. He was "The lamb slain from the foundation of the 
world" to take "away the sin of the world." 

And his care is to be extended beyond the present world. 
He is to provide for us in another world bodies and dwellings 
and a society, which alike are to be fair and imperishable. 
Here is a love full, steadfast, intelligent and lasting. A love 
which knowing all, is able to forgive all. A love capable 
of inspiring worthy love and so of fixing the heart in a cen- 
ter of rest. 



384 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

"Herein is love." As we think of it, how natural it is 
to sing with Wesley: 

"Love divine, all love excelling, 

Joy of heaven to earth come down! 
Fix in us thy humble dwelling 
All thy faithful mercies crown! 

"Breathe, O breathe thy loving spirit, 
Into every troubled breast! 
Let us all in thee inherit 

Let us find the promised rest ! ' ' 

A third source of spiritual unrest is in the conscience. 
"Conscience doth make cowards of us all." The sense of dis- 
agreement with the source of all, and the sense of inferiority 
and the fear which accompany it, are in every soul which 
can at all decide between right and wrong. The reason is 
that "all men have sinned." There is none good, no not one." 
Now has Jesus any balm for wounds of conscience? 

Why now we come to the very center of the gospel. Paul 
tells us that "being justified by faith we have peace with 
God through our Lord, Jesus Christ. ' ' That is, faith in Christ 
gives rest of conscience. But we are to accept Paul's testi- 
mony just now no further than it may appear to be intrinsically 
reasonable. So let us inquire how the gospel is suited to give 
peace of conscience to one who believes it. 

First, perhaps, in the working of gospel in us to bring us 
to peace of conscience, is the assurance that Jesus loves every 
human soul. That is, we are made sure by the gospel that 
Jesus would do for us whatever he could. And then we are 
assured by the gospel that Jesus is not only utterly loving 
but that he himself lived a flawless life. He is, therefore, a 
perfect sacrifice for sin. 

And then we observe with admiring wonder how God is 
enabled by Jesus to be "just," that is, to strike sin so that 
the very universe reels under the stroke, and, at the same 
time, to be "the justifier of him that believeth." The cross 
condemns sin and justifies the sinner. And further, when 
we see the holy heart of Jesus brimming over with compassion 
for us and are assured by him that he came from the Father 



HAHRY D. SMITH 385 

and that he and the Father are one, it no longer seems im- 
possible, but certain, that the holy God can and does forgive 
sins. 

Now if, with these assurances, one can say, I have accepted 
the pardon of Christ in the way pointed out by him, why 
should not peace come down upon his conscience "like rain 
upon the mown grass?" 

But it is time to conclude. We have seen that Jesus, in 
spite of labors, sufferings, and the cross itself, possesses the 
rest he proffers. We have seen that in his personal ministry 
and by his influence later, he gives rest of body to men, 
women, children and lower animals. We passed, without a 
glance at them, multitudes we might have seen of those fol- 
lowers of Jesus who in the most assiduous labors of life and 
in the pangs of horrible deaths exhibited the signs of inward 
peace which he himself exhibited. We declined to hear such 
followers 1 as they testified that they knew the secret of a peace 
that the world can neither give nor take away. We have seen 
that by its self-evidencing and authoritative character, the gos- 
pel is capable of giving rest of mind to him who believes it. 
We have seen that Jesus provides in his own unique and 
limitless love an anchor and a haven for every heart. We have 
seen that he has provided, in his affection for the sinner, his 
perfect life, and his death for sin, such a medicine for the 
fiery fever of the conscience as warrants one in hoping to 
be cured by it. His promise of rest for the soul is therefore a 
promise as credible as it is alluring. 

It remains to us in our present thinking together to con- 
sider any condition or conditions upon which Jesus bestows 
his priceless gift. "Take my yoke upon you and learn of me 
. . . . and ye shall find rest unto your souls." Thus 
he instructs us. That is, a yoke and learning are conditions 
of rest. What is it to take the yoke of Jesus upon us ? Clearly 
it is to submit to him. It is this, whatever else it may be. 
And how are we to submit to him? Quite simply, i.e., by be- 
ginning in sincerity to try to observe his directions as ex- 
pressions of the loftiest wisdom and as commands of the su- 



386 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

preme authority for the government of men. And what is it 
to learn of him? It is anything else than to continue thus 
in submission to him? But what would he have us do for 
him? "Why call ye me Lord, Lord, and do not the things which 
I say ? ' ' Clearly some task is to be performed for him. There 
is here no mere question of a tenet to be cherished, or an 
emotion to be nurtured, or a ritual to be celebrated, and 
perhaps enjoyed for its beauty and dignity. Once he di- 
rected the apostles to teach the peoples of the nations who 
should become his disciples "to observe all things whatso- 
ever" he had commanded them. Thus it becomes certain 
that rest may be had by submitting to and working for him. 
Was ever anything more startling or seemingly more revolu- 
tionary? Work and you shall have rest! 

And yet the matter is really simple. Who was ever peace- 
ful because he was idle? Is it not a commonplace of our ex- 
perience that idleness breeds restlessness while work is apt 
to make one contented? Work is not then, our daily ex- 
perience being the ground of our judgment, necessarily, an 
enemy of rest, but rather its good friend. When work is not 
the friend of the rest of spirit which we seek, it is, is it not, 
because the work is not congenial rather than merely because 
it is work? And why is it not congenial? Are there not two 
reasons either of which is possible? Perhaps our task is in 
itself good and proper but some fault in us keeps it from 
seeming so. Or perhaps we are right minded but our labor 
seems slight or unprofitable. Is not our need a "yoke" — i. e., 
a means of adjustment to our task? And who should be 
able suitably to adjust us to our task in this world if not One 
who is at once in the secret of our nature through wearing 
it himself, and in the secret of all labors through having made 
all things? 

Thus it appear that rest of soul may be found in Christ; 
and that it is to be attained by faith in Christ ; and that faith 
in Christ is a faith which works the will of Christ. 

I repeat, it is a weary world. But it is not without hope 
of rest, for Jesus invites it to rest. May it more and more 
accept his gracious invitation. 



ALLEN R. MOORE 

HpHE subject of this sketch came of Disciple stock, and for over 30 
•*■ years he has been an earnest student of the writings of Alexander 
Campbell. He has, therefore, like Timothy, inherited a splendid back- 
ground for his fine Christian character. 

Allen R. Moore was born and reared within five miles of Old Cane 
Ridge at North Middletown, Bourbon Co., Kentucky, August 31, 1865. 
His grandfather came into the Disciple Movement under " Raccoon' ' 
John Smith. Allen became a Christian at the age of ten years, Moses 
E. Lard taking his confession and John S. Sweeney baptizing him. At 
the age of eighteen, he graduated at Kentucky Classical and Business 
College, under the presidency of E. V. Zollars, taking the A.B. degree and 
delivering the Greek oration on Commencement day. At the age 20 he 
graduated in the Classical Department of the College of the Bible, which 
was at that time under the administration of that famous triumvirate, 
John W. McGarvey, Robert Graham and I. B. Grubbs. Among the pas- 
torates he has held are churches in Richmond, Va-, St. Paul, Minn., Mem- 
phis, Tenn., Lancaster, Ky., Birmingham, Ala., and Savannah, Ga., where 
he now ministers. He was ten years in Birmingham, and is in his fifth 
year in Savannah. He has had considerable experience as an editor, hav- 
ing been editor of the Missionary Weekly and Assistant Editor of the Chris- 
tian Guide. He is a frequent contributor to The Christian-Evangelist and 
The Christian Standard. He. is the author of two books: a small vol- 
ume, "Alexander Campbell and the General Convention;" and a book of 
sermons on The Acts of Apostles, entitled "The Gospel According to 
the Holy Spirit." A few years ago he visited the Holy Land and studied 
the places made famous; in the life of our Savior, and was greatly stimu- 
lated in his interest in Bible study and Bible teaching. 

Allen R. Moore is a preacher of no mean ability, but his success is as 
much owing to his heart power as to his intellectual attainments. This 
is why he is very popular with the people he serves. Among the Disciple 
preachers of the south he is distinguished as a leader in the worthy 
enterprises of the churches, and he can always be counted on the side of 
those who are in favor of legitimate progress. He not only has con- 
victions, but has the courage of these and when necessary, he is not 
afraid to speak and act without any regard to his personal interests. 

Mr. Moore has exerted a healthful influence for the Restoration Move- 
ment throughout several of the Southern states. He has contended for 
the best ideals of the Movement with an earnestness and faithfulness 
which has done much to counteract certain tendencies, the checking of 
which needed his wise and strong advocacy. 

387 



THE HOUSE BEAUTIFUL 

By Allen R. Moore 

Text. — "So Solomon overlaid the house within with pure gold; 
and he drew chains of gold across before the oracle; and 
he overlaid it with gold. And the whole house he overlaid 
with gold, until the house was finished: also the whole 
altar that belonged to the oracle he overlaid with gold." — 
1 Kings 6 :21, 22. 

"Know ye not that we are the temple of God, and that the 
Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man destroy eth the 
temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of 
God is holy, and such are ye." — 1 Corinthians 3:16, 17. 

WE live in a beautiful world. God has endowed us with a 
love for the beautiful and surrounded us with abundant 
material with which to satisfy that love. In nature, in art, 
in religion, we are lovers of the beautiful. 

When David had established his kingdom and had grown 
great and rich, he desired to build a house for the worship 
of God. He had already built the king's palace of cedar 
wood, and he felt ashamed to live in such splendor while 
the ark of God still rested in a tent. But God forbade David 
to build a temple. He had been a man of war and blood 
and it was not fitting that he build the temple, lest the na- 
tions say that Jehovah's religion is established by the con- 
quest of the sword and the house built with the spoils of war. 
But God said to David, "Wihen thy days are fulfilled, and 
thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, I will set up thy seed after 
thee, that shall proceed out of thy bowels, and I will es- 
tablish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, 
and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever." 

This must have been a disappointment to David, for he 
had set his heart upon building the house ; yet, he was deeply 

389 



390 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

gratified, for, while he was not permitted to build the house, 
God promised to establish his throne and his house forever, 
and that was far more than the building of a temporary 
house of worship. He realized that and thanked God, who 
made him to understand that, as the Divine religion is a min- 
ister of peace, the temple should be a symbol of peace and 
must be built by a prince of peace. 

Solomon's Temple 

Solomon, the great and wise king, was truly a prince of 
peace, and as such he was permitted to build the house of 
God. And he made it great and strong and beautiful. It 
was "built of stone, made ready at the quarry, and there 
was neither hammer nor axe nor any tool of iron heard in the 
house while it was building." And "the whole house within 
was overlaid with pure gold." Nothing like it had been seen 
in the earth before, and it is probable that nothing quite so 
fine has been seen since. 

It was fitting that the house should be set apart in a 
solemn dedication. All Israel came together. The king, him- 
self, conducted the service of dedication. And while there 
was so much that appealed to the eye, the king made it plain 
that he, at least, realized that this magnificent structure was 
not an end in itself, but only a means to an end. In his 
prayer of dedication he asked, "But will God in very deed 
dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens 
cannot contain thee; how much less this house that I have 
builded ! ' ' Jehovah was not a ' ' local deity, ' ' but was God of 
heaven and earth. And while the house could not contain 
him, Solomon entreated, "Hearken unto the cry and prayer 
of thy servant, that thine eyes may be open toward this house 
night and day, even toward the place where thou hast said 
'My name shall be there.' " And he continued, "When they 
shall pray toward this place, hear thou in heaven thy dwelling 
place and when thou hearest, forgive." The temple was a 
meeting place between God and man; its altar pointed the 
way of atonement; its candlesticks, its table of shew bread, 



ALLEN R. MOORE 391 

its altar of prayer pointed the way of light 'and life and peace ; 
its beauty symbolized the beauty of the soul gained through 
union with God. 

The Christian Temple 

But we are not to dwell upon the temple built by Solomon. 
Another temple is being reared, of which that was the type 
and which is of far greater importance. "Know ye not that 
ye are the temple of God?" Ages were required in the 
preparation for this temple, and ages are being used in its 
construction and completion. What is this temple, what its 
character, and how is the work of construction being done? 

If the temple in Jerusalem impressed the world by its im- 
posing grandeur and material splendor ,the very opposite is 
true of the Christian temple, which existed for a generation, 
or more, without the building of houses, or any outward 
manifestation, calculated to impress the world. This building 
is spiritual, not material, and its work is divine, not human. 
Yet, because man is both material and spiritual, it is neces- 
sary that there should be some structural work suited to the 
material side of his nature. Thus, through the things which 
are seen, we may reach the things which are not seen. 

Foundation: "Other foundation can no man lay than that 
which is laid, which is Jesus Christ." Here is something 
new in temple building. Great stones were hewn out as 
foundation stones for Solomon's temple; here, a living being 
is declared to be the foundation. "Thou art the Christ, 
the Son of the living God," declared the apostle. And to 
this Jesus responded, "Thou art petros (a little stone), and 
upon this petra (the broad, foundation rock showing that Jesus 
himself is the long expected Christ) I will build my church, and 
the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it." Whatever 
this temple is to be, then, Christ himself is to be the founda- 
tion, and "other foundation can no man lay than that which 
is laid, which is Jesus Christ." 

The Material: "Let each man take heed how he buildeth 
thereon." What is the material that must go into the su- 
perstructure of this temple? Some have said that it is doc- 



392 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

trine; that a man must take heed whether he teaches true doc- 
trine, or false doctrine. It is true that every man is responsi- 
ble for the doctrine he teaches, and will be held accountable 
therefor; but the temple is not made up of doctrine. 

Some have held that this building is composed very largely 
of forms and ceremonies; of ordinance and ritual, and about 
these they have built up great institutions. Admittance is 
conditioned upon submission to fixed forms, and the life of 
the individual must conform to prescribed ceremonies. It 
is as if one would say, "Man was made for the institution 
called the church, and not the church for man." 

No, the material built into this temple is not doctrine, nor 
ordinance, nor ritual. It is human beings. Men and women 
constitute the material of which the temple of God is being 
built. Christ is the foundation stone, and upon this personal 
foundation men and women are builded into the holy struc- 
ture. Some are gold, some silver and some are costly stones. 
Some are wood, some are hay and some are stubble. But all 
are living beings. The material used in ordinary building 
represents, in this teaching of the apostle, the material used 
in this extraordinary building. As the foundation is the Christ 
himself, so the material built upon that foundation is the peo- 
ple who have been redeemed by him. 

The whole structure is to be tested as by fire, and if there 
is any perishable material like wood, hay or stubble, it shall 
be removed. Men and women who do not live worthily are 
this perishable material. They cannot endure the test that 
is to be brought upon them and they will drop out, or be lost. 
And he who brought them in shall lose his reward, for the 
material was not worthy; but he himself shall be saved, with- 
out the reward for converting others, provided he stands the 
test in which they failed. 

How Prepared: But how is this human material prepared 
for this temple, and how is it built into the superstructure? 
How do we come into relation to Christ as house is related to 
foundation? This is a vital question and must not be passed 
over. 



ALLEN R. MOORE 393 

Faith: "Without faith it is impossible to please God." 
"He that would come to God must first believe that he is r 
and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him." 
"With the heart man believeth unto righteousness." "Ye be- 
lieve in God, believe also in me." "Believe on the Lord 
Jesus and thou shalt be saved." "For we are all children of 
God by faith in Christ Jesus." 

In the presence of such Scriptures no one can deny that 
faith is essential. But no one is likely to deny that. The 
question arises, is not faith enough? Are we not saved by 
faith only? It has been so taught, but is the doctrine borne 
out by the Scripture? Let us proceed cautiously, lest we lose 
our reward through bringing in material not duly prepared. 

Repentance: "Thus it is written, that the Christ should 
suffer, and rise again from the dead the third day; and that 
repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his 
name unto all the nations." "Now he commandeth all men 
that they should all everywhere repent." As faith brings 
us to understand God our father, and causes us to love him 
even as he loved us through his son Jesus, so repentance 
brings us to a decision to turn away from that life that led 
us away from him, and coming back to him, walk in the foot- 
steps of Jesus. It is that change of mind, or decision of the 
will which leads to reformation of life. Repentance is vital. 

Confession : Still another step is required in the preparation. 
"With the heart man believeth unto righteousness and with 
the mouth confession is made unto salvation." "If thou shalt 
confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord, and shalt believe in 
thy heart that God raised him from the dead, thou shalt be 
saved." This is called the "Good confession." It is the con- 
fession that Peter made, and it is the witness that Jesus bore 
for himself before Pilate. Instead of this, a great church 
has established "the Confessional" to which a communicant 
may go and confess his sins to a priest and receive absolution. 
Certainly that is not what the apostle meant when he spoke 
of the confession. It is well to confess our faults one to an- 
other, and pray oft one for another; but the confession is the 



394 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

public acknowledgment of the Lordship and Christhood of 
Jesus. It was required as a condition of admission to the 
church. It is, indeed, the one doctrinal test, for it is upon 
this rock that Jesus said, "I will build my church;" and he 
who makes that confession is built into the church that stands 
upon that rock. 

It would seem from these plain statements that this is all 
a man has to do to be saved, or to complete his preparation 
to be a building stone in the house beautiful. But such is not 
the case, for the Master builder requires yet another process 
in the preparation of the material, and that is — 

Baptism: In sending his disciples into all the world Jesus 
said, "Preach the gospel to every creature; he that believeth 
and is baptized shall be saved; he that believeth not, shall be 
condemned. ' ' The first time they attempted to obey that com- 
mandment, Peter said to the people who cried out on the day 
of Pentecost, "Repent ye, and be baptized every one of you 
in the name of Jesus Christ unto the remission of your sins; 
and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." Paul said 
to the Galatians, "We are all sons of God by faith in Christ 
Jesus; for as many of you as were baptized into Christ did 
put on Christ." Baptism, therefore, being a commandment of 
Christ and a step in the process by which we receive remission 
of sins, and a means of putting* on Christ, and the proof of our 
faith, is an essential step in the preparation of the material 
ior the temple of God. 

It will be observed that salvation is promised in connection 
with each one of these first principles. That does not mean 
that there are four ways in which a man may be saved and 
that he can take his choice of the four. There are not four 
ways, but one way, and all that is said of each must be in- 
cluded. They are steps in a process that leads to Christ. They 
are not four groups of Scripture, each complete in itself, and 
each able to save. They are rather Scriptures that explain 
steps in a process that we do not always stop to analyze, but 
a process, every step of which is essential in putting on 
Christ. One passage does not exclude another, but all must 



ALLEN R. MOORE 395 

be included, for each fills its own place. Christ only is the 
Savior, and these steps show us the way to reach him. 

Nor is there anything arbitrary about these requirements. 
Baptism is not an arbitrary and meaningless ceremony. It 
sets forth beautifully and impressively the way of life. It is 
a picture, or indeed, a dramatic presentation of the death 
burial and resurrection of Christ. It typifies our own death 
to sin, the burial of the old man, and our resurrection to a 
new life. Nor is that all. Baptism also prefigures the final 
dissolution of our bodies, their burial in the grave and our 
triumphant resurrection in that great day. Surely there is 
no act, no ordinance, no symbol that means, or could possibly 
mean so much as this, and no man who understands the spirit- 
ual significance of baptism would want for one day to live 
without it. 

Thus far I have spoken only of the preparation of the build- 
ing material, the preparation of men and women to become 
living stones, or silver, or gold in the temple of God. So far 
as we are concerned, this is but the beginning of Christian ex- 
perience. Let no one suppose that we are to be built as inert 
stones, there to lie impassively until the day of judgment. We 
are living stones, and life means activity, growth, develop- 
ment. No single figure of speech is adequate to prevent the 
full teaching of Divine truth. Paul, the apostle, may be said 
to have been a foundation stone, yet he also speaks of him- 
self as a master builder. Those who had been built into the 
temple were also bringing and building others in, for they 
were " living" stones. So, there opens up to us the whole 
range of Christian activity, the development of character, 
growth in grace and in knowledge and a life of service on be- 
half of our fellowmen. And just here Christianity has given 
to the world an ideal that no other religion has ever pro- 
duced. We may appreciate this better if we look for a mo- 
ment at the ideals that have come to us out of the past. Three 
great nations gave to the world three great ideals in temple 
building. I refer to Egypt, Greece and Israel. 



396 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

The Noble Ideal op Egypt 

Egypt believed in the immortality of man. Other ancient 
nations shared this belief, but Egypt, more than any other 
ancient nation emphasized it and sought to preserve it for 
future generations. In the building of her monuments she 
studied durability, and selected material and designed such 
structures as were thought to be permanent, such as would 
perpetuate the names of her illustrious rulers to unknown 
generations. In that she came as near to success as could be 
with the use of earthly materials. After thousands of years 
many of her monuments are still standing, and promise to 
stand for other thousands to come. 

In the building of her temples the immortality of man was 
the central theme illustrated. The gods were worshiped as 
they administered to the needs of man — the man of the future, 
the immortal man, rather than the needs of man in this life- 
time. 

They worshiped mystery and strength because these 
seemed to hold the key to the future. The beetle rolling its 
ball along the path was an Egyptian god. It appeared in the 
springtime, lived a brief life, and then disappeared, only to 
come back again with the next spring. They did not under- 
stand it. The mystery of its recurring life suggested im- 
mortality and they worshiped it as a god. The sacred bull 
was worshiped as a god, for the animal in its superior strength 
was a symbol of divine strength, and the future of the soul, 
man's immortality, rested upon the strength of the gods. The 
river Nile was a god. Its source was unknown, the cause of 
its flood and overflow was a mystery. In a land where little 
rain ever falls it was not easy to understand that there could 
be a region where rains would fall in such excess as to push a 
mighty river through thousands of miles of sand and desert. 
This mystery of the Nile was the source of their national pros- 
perity and even existence. Without it, they could not live. 
Therefore, the river was to them a god. 

They embalmed the bodies of their dead because of their 
belief in immortality. When the soul left the body it en- 



ALLEN R. MOORE 397 

tered that of the sacred bird and was borne away to the home 
of the gods; but the body must be preserved until the time 
for the soul to return and once more take up its abode there. 
Therefore it was embalmed and preserved for that future 
event. The art of embalming has been lost to the world, but 
the belief in the immortality of man remains. 

It is a noble ideal and worthy of preservation, but it was 
preserved at tremendous cost. It was at the cost of human 
liberty. Thousands of men slaved through long years for the 
erection of these monuments and temples. Nations were over- 
thrown and races were enslaved in order that they might make 
their unwilling contribution. It was not man present and liv- 
ing that they sought to uplift and ennoble, T)ut man of the 
future, man after death, man immortalized. 

The Beautiful Dream of the Greek 

There arose across the sea another nation with a different 
ideal in religion. The Greek believed in immortality, but that 
which he emphasized most in his religion was the beautiful. 
A thing beautiful was a thing divine. The gods were beauti- 
ful and only that which was beautiful could be used in their 
worship. The Greeks built many beautiful temples and 
brought the art of architecture to a state of perfection. They 
were the dwelling place of the gods and must be beautiful to 
be acceptable. Their statuary, the figures of the gods were 
beautiful. They worshiped symmetry, beauty, perfection. 
And as their images were portrayals of their gods in marble, 
or ivory and gold, they would not be fit for worship if they 
were not perfect and beautiful. 

The ornamentation and decorations of their temples car- 
ried out this ideal of beauty. The stately columns, the capi- 
tals, the ram's horn, the acanthus leaf, the intertwining of 
vines and flowers all were but their highest conception of the 
beautiful, and in the midst of it all they placed the egg and 
dart, symbols of life and death. Religion was their hope in 
life and death, but it was the religion of the beautiful. The 
beautiful meant life; that which was ugly meant death. No 



398 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

other nation ever reached such perfection in art and architec- 
ture. Rome copied from the Greeks and built temples far and 
near, but Rome did not create, she merely copied those beau- 
tiful ideals. 

But while the Greeks worshiped the beautiful, it was the 
beauty of body and mind rather than beauty of character 
and spirit. They adored the beauty of form and figure and 
the brilliance and beauty of the intellect, while their temples 
often were places of vice and lust. The highest need of man 
is served in moral development and growth, and in this, in 
spite of their beautiful art, architecture and philosophy, they 
fell short. 

The Grand Conception of Israel 

Another ideal has come down to us from the past. Younger 
than Egypt, older than Greece, Palestine has given to the 
world an ideal through God's chosen people, Israel. Believ- 
ing in immortality and not despising the beautiful, Israel 
laid chief stress upon neither of these. Instead, she gave to 
the world the ideal of manhood. Her law was the true stand- 
ard of morals. She denned sin and drew a sharp line against 
immorality. She taught the world sacredness — sacredness of 
religion, of the home and of life. She taught purity and holi- 
ness. God is pure and holy and to be pleasing to him, man 
must be pure and holy. It was not beauty, nor immortality 
that the world needed most. It was manhood, Godlike man- 
hood, and this she sought to give to the world through her 
law and religion. Did she succeed? Yes, in the person of one 
man. She produced one man and only one, who attained to 
that magnificent ideal. And that man was not Moses, nor Da- 
vid, nor Isaiah, but Jesus of Nazareth. Tried by the standard of 
the Law of Moses, he was perfect. Tried by Pilate under the 
Roman law, no fault was found in him. Tried by the Devil, 
being tempted in all points as we are tempted, he was without 
sin. He was the one perfect man of the human race. He 
was the product of Israel and her Divine law. He was the Son 
of God and son of man, perfect, Divine man, the ideal of a 
race. 



ALLEN R. MOORE 399 

In all her history of fifteen centuries from Moses to Christ, 
Israel built but one temple. True it was partly destroyed and 
rebuilt twice, but it was one temple, with one ideal and one 
standard of worship. She developed no art and no worthy 
architecture beyond that of the one temple. But that was 
enough. From the religion that centered in that temple came 
to ideal man, and in him we find the realization of all the 
ideals of beauty of soul and character, and of immortality. 

The Sublime Purpose of the Christ 

The ideals of the past were achieved in large measure at 
the expense of man's comfort and happiness. They were 
achieved through enforced, unwilling service. Sometimes 
they were achieved through the oppression and misery of the 
masses. Christ has introduced a new order of things. His 
purpose is to uplift the whole human race. "God so loved 
the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever 
believeth on him should not perish but have everlasting life." 
"It is the will of the Father that not one of these little ones 
should perish." 

In the past men have been made great by overriding the 
rights of the multitude. Kings have been elevated to thrones 
that rested upon the prostrate forms of their subjects. It 
was as if the gardener were to pluck a thousand buds from 
the rose bush in order that the entire strength of the plant 
might go into one blosson. The common people were nothing. 
Royalty was everything. 

All that has been changed. The growth of democracy in 
the world is due to the teaching of Jesus. Better that a mill- 
stone be hanged about the neck of a man and that he be cast 
into the sea, than that he cause one of these little ones to 
perish. A man, no matter how poor, how obscure, how sin- 
ful he may be, a man is of more value in the sight of God than 
all the wealth and splendor of the world. Jesus Christ pro- 
poses, through his church to reach every man, of every race 
and every nation, and lift him up, redeem him, sanctify him, 
glorify him and make him fit for the presence of God. To do 



400 THE NEW LIVING PULPIT 

that he must place upon his heart and life his own imagine 
and likeness. 

It is a beautiful conception of the women of the South to 
have the figure of Robert E. Lee, and other Confederate gen- 
erals, mounted upon their war chargers, carved in heroic size 
upon the face of Stone mountain. There through the ages 
these figures in granite will look down upon the multitudes 
who pass by and teach the lessons of love, loyalty and sacri- 
fice for the cause they loved. But it is a far grander concep- 
tion that Jesus has given to us, that of carving the image of 
God upon the heart and soul of every man. And as that 
image looks out upon the passerby it must ever teach the 
lessons of love, mercy, pardon, peace, service, life. 

Religion is life, and life means growth and development. 
The growth of character is the supreme thing in the life of 
man. Only as the character grows does man become Godlike. 
And as he becomes Godlike, more and more will he seek the 
redemption and glorification of his fellowmen. 

These are the living stones built into the temple of God. 
These are the men and women who are silver, gold and pre- 
cious stones. These are they who shall stand the test, though 
they be tried by fire. These are they, of whom it is said, 
"Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the 
Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man destroy the tem- 
ple of God, him will God destroy; for the temple of God is 
holy, and such are ye." 

This is the House Beautiful. It is not constructed of mar- 
ble, or ivory, or silver, or gold. It is built of men and women, 
who have been redeemed and who have grown into the char- 
acter and likeness of the Christ. It is for the indwelling of 
the Holy Spirit. It is the Temple of God, which temple we 
are. 



